


Starcrossed

by bad_peppermint



Category: Bandom, Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Depression, M/M, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-20
Updated: 2013-06-20
Packaged: 2017-12-15 13:55:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 27,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/850326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bad_peppermint/pseuds/bad_peppermint
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Of all the patrons Brendon's ghostly book mobile has, Spencer Smith is his favorite. Spencer, too young and too scared in a city 2,000 miles from home, is the first to find Brendon, to climb into the old Fleetwood and run his hands over the books he hasn't seen since childhood. Even if they had nothing else in common, that would be enough. Brendon just wants to be seen, and Spencer just wants to be heard, and if they were anyone else, they would be a match made in Heaven.</p><p>But Brendon has a job to do, and Spencer has his own demons to wrestle with, and while Spencer is pulling Brendon closer to the land of the living, all Brendon seems to do is drag Spencer further down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Starcrossed

**Author's Note:**

> Based on Audrey Niffenegger's graphic novel _The Night Bookmobile,_ which is apparently based on H.G. Wells' short story _The Door in the Wall_. It's a bit unusual, but definitely worth checking out.
> 
>    
> The extras created for this story are absolutely gorgeous. ♥
> 
> ART: [Four Pieces](http://bad-peppermint.livejournal.com/23606.html#cutid1) by [akamine_chan](http://akamine-chan.dreamwidth.org/). Lovely! Go check them out.
> 
> MIXES: ~~["the night book mobile"](http://bad-peppermint.livejournal.com/23606.html#cutid2)~~ ["the night book mobile"](http://archiveofourown.org/works/850766) by [leish](http://leish.dreamwidth.org/) and ["Until the Sun Rises"](http://bad-peppermint.livejournal.com/23606.html#cutid3) by [truthismusic](http://truthismusic.dreamwidth.org/), both of which are fantastic and should be listened to forever and ever.
> 
>  
> 
> Huge thanks go out to these guys, my wonderful beta and brainstorming-buddy [abtagrl](http://abtagrl.dreamwidth.org/), and the mods at [BandomBigBang](http://bandombigbang.dreamwidth.org/) for organizing this whole mess and rolling with everything I threw at them. I couldn't have done it without you.

Spencer Smith likes to listen to the Dixie Chicks when he’s feeling blue. Brendon knows this the way he knows everything else about Spencer; because he’s filed it, logged it, shelved it away. He’s stored every piece of paper, every envelope scrap and every internet ad Spencer Smith has ever read, filed them all neatly away on the shelves of his book mobile whenever they arrived in his inbox from on high. He’s Spencer’s Librarian, and he keeps track of everything Spencer reads.

So he’s had a couple of years to grow used to the patterns, and he’s almost positive now: When Spencer gets a mean email from his friend Ryan, he googles the lyrics to _You Were Mine_. When his grades are bad, he reads the liner notes on _Taking the Long Way_. Brendon likes knowing things like that. They make him feel connected to a world he hasn’t been a part of in years, and they also make him feel closer to Spencer, and he doesn’t think anybody is still in the dark about who could possibly be Brendon’s favorite.

He’s not supposed to have any, of course. The Night Book Mobile services a number of patrons, each with a personal library of the things they’ve read, text messages and books and DVD covers and street signs, in their average little lives; Spencer’s just one of them. Brendon is in charge of quite a few collections, and he should technically be equally diligent in his care for each of them.

In reality, though, Spencer Smith is the one Brendon likes the best.

His tastes mesh with Brendon the most – he’s a decent reader, but lacks the kind of pretentious sophistication Brendon likes to roll his eyes at. He likes to read, clearly, but it doesn’t consume him, and whenever Spencer starts a new series, Brendon is pretty much guaranteed to like it as well.

But Brendon also gets the feeling, from Spencer’s letters and his notes, the doodles he draws into the margins of his Intro to Bio textbook, that Spencer is lonely sometimes. He’s here, in Chicago, the same city Brendon’s Fleetwood is currently parked in, all alone, having followed a best friend to college who had already found a new group of people to hang out with by the time Spencer arrived. From what Brendon can tell, Spencer spends a lot of his time reading because there’s not really anything else to do, and considering Brendon’s entire existence is based on reading other people’s books in the back of his RV, it’s really no grand surprise that Brendon can relate.

Spencer, even though they’ve never met, is Brendon’s very favorite – his rock, his light, whatever else a person can be when they don’t even know you exist. Brendon doesn’t care about that bit, though. Spencer makes him feel better when he’s sad, and make him even happier when he’s having a good day. Spencer is like the best kind of medicine, and sometimes, when he’s feeling especially low, Brendon tugs the very last book off the shelf and reads along with Spencer, always lagging a few letters behind, eyes trailing over the words appearing on the pages.

It’s _The Gods Themselves_ , at the moment, one of the few books by Isaac Asimov that Spencer hasn’t read yet. Or so Brendon assumes – it’s hard to tell, of course, considering he hasn’t left his bus since he got the job, but judging from the sheer amount of paperbacks filed under _Science Fiction, A-M_ , there can’t be many more. It’s not Brendon’s favorite style ever, but that doesn’t stop him from reading it as well. It makes him feel connected to the real world outside his bus in a way little else can, and besides, it’s not like he has a whole lot else to do. Sure, shelving takes some time, but he’s been doing it for so long that it’s become second nature to him, and besides, Spencer is just that tiny bit more interesting than sorting and resorting the same books over and over.

Out of all of Brendon’s collections, Spencer’s is the one he’s most drawn to. The one he’s most fascinated by. Perhaps it’s just because he’s in Spencer’s city that he’s so preoccupied with him now – he goes all over the country for his patrons, and Chicago is the place Spencer calls home. So Chicago is where Brendon’s at, taking up three spaces in a lot across from a CVS in Wicker Park.

It’s a warm summer evening, and he’s got the doors open to let in a refreshing breeze. It’s get hot in the bus, hot enough that Brendon would strip down to his underwear if he weren’t at his _job_ , and sitting here like this, with the doors open and the music on low, makes him feel like he has at least a chance of cooling off.

He’s been parked here for what seems like forever, watching Mexican moms and dads and kids and teens wander up and down the streets, poking their heads into shops and maybe going in, maybe not. It’s almost completely dark now and they’ll probably all head home soon, but that’s fine. If there’s one thing Brendon’s learned while doing this job, it’s that all kinds of interesting people emerge from their hideouts once the sun sets.

It’s probably a plus that they don’t notice him, though – it makes him feel a lot safer, even if there’s a pretty big, if unadmitted part of him that kind of can’t wait for the day when somebody finally knocks on his door.

On cue, the radio switches from _Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word_ to _Baker Street_ , and the jump would be absolutely hilarious if Brendon didn’t know that Spencer went through just about every musical style during his drummer phase, even if it meant playing through the eighties songbooks his aunts got him for Christmas.

Brendon hums along for a little bit, absently. He shuffles down the shelves like maybe he’s dancing a little bit, just by himself, straightening a book here or righting a spine there even though there’s not really anything for him to do.

Maybe if Spencer comes to find him this time, he’ll move the books around, shelve them in the wrong places the way Brendon always had in libraries when he’d been a kid, and then Brendon will see him and maybe even talk to him a bit and then have something to do for a little while.

If Brendon had any idea what day it was, and if it so happened to be around his birthday, Brendon would wish to meet Spencer. One of the others would do, as well, because he thinks maybe he’s just desperately starved for attention at this point, but he has a preference: There are just some of his patrons that he’d like to meet more than others, and his favorite is without a doubt Spencer Smith.

 

* * *

 

It’s getting to be around midnight when the stereo switches from _Gimme Shelter_ to _Funkytown_. The former isn’t his favorite – it was barely more than alright in the beginning, and he’s heard it far too many times since then – but _Funkytown_ he can’t get through sitting still. The beat just makes him want to dance.

Since he’s supposed to be looking out for patrons and probably not making the worst first impression possible, he settles for tapping out the bass line against the steering wheel, whistling along absently, and it probably takes him far, far too long to notice that there’s a guy standing by the bus doors, looking straight at him.

“Hi there,” he says, peering curiously into the bus, and Brendon’s heart picks up the pace.

“Hello,” he says, looking down the steps. This is Spencer – it has to be Spencer, because only Spencer would be able to see this bus. Only Spencer would notice Brendon, and only Spencer would actually talk to him.

Brendon hasn’t talked to anyone in years.

“Yeah, hi,” Spencer says again, looking a little bemused. He has a beard, which Brendon didn’t know about, and he’s also taller, but that was to be expected. He’s had a vague idea of what Spencer might look like, updated whenever someone scribbled something into Spencer’s yearbook or printed out the Smith Family Holiday cards. Still, it doesn’t really compare to actually laying eyes on his charge for the very first time, seeing him standing there proud and tall and possibly a little confused.

“Are you… open for business?” Spencer asks, gesturing at the _OPEN_ sign flickering at the door.

Brendon stares at him for a moment before he suddenly remembers himself and nods, a little frantic perhaps. “Come in, come in,” he says, getting up and then stepping back so Spencer can move past him.

Spencer hesitates for a moment, glancing over his shoulder once, before he lays one hand on the railing and steps up, filling out the entire doorway. He shuffles past Brendon with an awkward little smile, and then turns towards the bookshelves and freezes. “Woah,” he says.

Brendon laughs, perhaps a little hysterically, into Spencer’s back. He doesn’t mean to act like a spaz, but he can’t help it. It’s Spencer. Brendon knows just about everything there is to know about Spencer – his grades, his work reviews, that note he wrote to Ryan about how sex was with his girlfriend. Brendon’s a little excited to finally meet him, that’s all.

“Are these all your books?” Spencer asks, looking back over his shoulder.

Brendon shakes his head. He fumbles in his jeans pockets for his card, and then almost trips over his feet trying to go through the pockets of his coat that he’d draped over the back of the driver’s seat. When he finally does manage to locate one, it’s a little crumpled, but still easy enough to read:

_The Night Book Mobile_

_Brendon B. Urie, Librarian_

_Open from sundown to sunup_

“Librarian, huh?” Spencer says, handing the card back. “Guess a job’s a job.”

“I like this place,” Brendon says, frowning. He does. He just gets a little lonely sometimes.

“The hours are terrible, though,” Spencer says, turning away. “Is it some kind of outreach project?”

“Not exactly,” Brendon says, while Spencer bends down to examine the rows of books.

“Hey, I know this one,” he says, delighted. He fishes it out of the shelf with a lot less care than Brendon would have liked, and flips through it with a genuine grin on his face. “Hey, I think this is the same version I had.”

It would probably be a good opportunity to bring up the truth behind the library, the reason _why_ the book dwarfed by Spencer’s enormous hands is the exact one he had as a child, but Brendon bites his lip instead. The story is going to sound crazy, after all, and maybe Spencer will think Brendon’s a nut job and leave. Brendon doesn’t want Spencer to leave. He only just got to meet him, after all.

So he makes an agreeing sound instead, just a vague “Mhmm,” and watches from the corner of his eyes as Spencer gets distracted by another title, and then another, picking his way down the shelves with the copy of _The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe_ forgotten in his hand. He’s all the way into Young Adult before he looks up and sees Brendon watching him.

“This is crazy,” he says, still grinning, though it’s faded a bit into confusion. “Like, really crazy. I’m pretty sure I’ve read almost all of these.”

“All of these,” Brendon says, before he thinks better of it.

Spencer’s brows furrow together in confusion. “What?”

Brendon bites his lip, wishing he could undo the last few moments, but from the look on Spencer’s face, he can tell his visitor isn’t going to just let it go. Because that would just be too damn simple, wouldn’t it?

So he lets his arms droop at his sides and sighs deeply. “You’ve actually read all of these,” he says.

Spencer laughs, shaking his head. Brendon’s not sure he prefers that reaction to the expected suspicion and accusations of stalking. “I think I’d know it if I’d read enough books to fill any kind of library,” Spencer throws back at him instead, lips still curled up in amusement. “And even if I had, I seriously doubt anyone would bother to gather them all together.” He waves his hands at the books, _his_ books, stacked all around him, as if to say, _and then display them here,_ as well.

“I’ m serious,” Brendon says quietly, looking down at his shoes.

When he glances up again, Spencer is giving him a highly doubtful look, though it eventually eases into a disbelieving toss of his hair before he turns back to the books, frowning still.

“Whatever,” Brendon hears him mutter.

“I _am_ ,” Brendon insists. His teachers always accused him of having poor impulse control, whatever, he might as well live up to their expectations. “You’ve read every book in this library, that’s why they’re _here_. It’s _your_ library, you know? Your very own personal night book mobile.”

“Funny,” Spencer scoffs. He doesn’t sound very amused. “Is comedian your other job?”

“I’m serious,” Brendon insists again, missing a stellar opportunity to agree and save himself the humiliation.

Spencer shakes his head, lips curling in an unamused sneer. “You know, that’d be creepy if it weren’t so ridiculous.”

“Right,” Brendon says with a sigh, giving up. “Sorry.”

Spencer treats him to a suspicious look, but when Brendon doesn’t say anything else, he turns away and reaches for another book. He’s still wary, without a doubt, but at least he’s not storming out the door yet, and at this stage, Brendon will take what he can get.

With the wary look still firmly on Spencer’s face, Brendon opts to stay clear for now, occupying himself with shelf-reading even though he’s dying to pounce on Spencer and ask him everything he’s ever wanted to know.

He ends up losing himself in the task regardless, soothed by the well-known monotony, and he legitimately startles when Spencer suddenly comes storming towards him, expression promising certain doom.

“Where did you get this?” Spencer demands. He brandishes a book at Brendon, close enough that Brendon can make out the signature scribbled on the inside cover.

When he blinks, trying to gather his thoughts together in the face of Spencer’s ire, Spencer comes even closer, barking, “Tell me!”

Brendon draws back, startled and uncertain, and tries a reassuring smile. He’s never actually been in this situation, and while he’s imagined it many times, it’s never gone down quite like this. “Um.”

“What kind of game are you playing here?” Spencer asks. He sounds kind of shaky and he’s pale, and Brendon kind of feels like the worst person on the planet.

“No – no game,” he stammers, and he knows he doesn’t sound believable even without seeing it reflected on Spencer’s face. “Spencer, I promise it’s nothing sinister.”

“And you know my name,” Spencer says with a harsh laugh, throwing his hands up into the air. “Fuck this, I’m out of here.”

He pushes past Brendon before Brendon has a chance to gather his panicked thoughts, and he’s almost at the door by the time Brendon’s managed to spin around and call after him. “Spencer, wait.”

“Yeah, no," Spencer says, voice hard. “I don’t know what your problem is, but you’re obviously off your rocker, and I’m not about to hang around and find out what else you’re cooking up.”

“Spencer,” Brendon says again, hating the plaintive tone of his voice.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Spencer snaps, throwing his hand up, and Brendon jerks back automatically.

Spencer looks almost sorry for a brief moment before his face hardens and he shakes his head. “Don’t you dare follow me,” he says.

He doesn’t look back on his way out the door, rushing down the stairs like a man possessed. He’s out of sight before Brendon can rightly follow him, try to hold him back, try to _explain_ , and Brendon presses the heel of his hand into his eye and sighs. This is the very thing he was afraid of: The absolute worst case scenario, worse than Spencer freaking out and worse even than Spencer acting like the whole thing was one big joke. He can’t even go after him and bring him back, and now Spencer won’t ever come back to him, he won’t, he’ll chalk the whole thing up to Brendon being a crazy person and Brendon will never see him again.

Well. That just went swimmingly, didn’t it?

Brendon sits down on the carpet with a heavy, slightly painful thump, shuffling back on his ass until he can feel the books and the bookshelves digging comfortingly into his back. Seeing Spencer here, now, has only managed to bring home for him just how alone he always is, how much he’s craved human contact; just a look, a smile – anything. It’s just made going back to his usual nothing all that more painful.

He’s not about to cry about it, he’s too damn jaded for that, but he still pulls his knees to his chest so he can hide his face. Seriously, does he really deserve this? Karma can’t be _this_ much of a bitch.

He clenches his fingers in the fabric at his knees and sighs, long and heartfelt. The position pushes his glasses off his nose at an awkward angle, but he can’t rightly bring himself to care. He’s gone back to being all alone. One brief, shining moment, and then he’s had to ruin it all by being too damn honest. He’s had Spencer here, and he’s ruined it, and this is the end.

As it turns out, it’s not. Some not so long period of time later, Brendon startles when he hears footsteps, even though there’s only one person it can be. And it is; it’s Spencer, treading carefully along the carpet, one hand at an angle like he might try to soothe Brendon with it if he spooks.

Brendon blinks at him, stupidly, and Spencer goes a little red.

“Hey,” he says, quietly, settling down next to Brendon. His hand is warm and broad over Brendon’s spine. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“You came back,” Brendon says. He reaches up and adjusts the earpiece of his glasses where they’ve been pushed askew.

“I did,” Spencer says. He wriggles a bit so his back is against the bookshelf and crosses his long legs on the floor, apparently satisfied now to be comfortable that Brendon is no longer freaking out. “I’m sorry for yelling at you.”

“It’s okay,” Brendon says, even though the lump in his throat is still there. He takes off his glasses to distract himself, gathering up a handful of his t-shirt to clean them with. Without them, Spencer is nothing but a big colorful blur. “Why did you come back?”

Spencer laughs, and moves, and when Brendon resettles his glasses on his nose, he can see that Spencer has his fingers pushed into his hair. “Well, I wasn’t going to, and I even made it all the way to Haddon before I thought, ‘How many times am I going to find a library that’s just for me?’ And I didn’t know if I’d ever have a chance to see it again, so I turned around and came back.”

He smiles at Brendon; just a little smile. Brendon would love to assure him that he can come back anytime, but he knows that’s not how it works. He might be new at this gig, too, but he still knows better than to make promises like that.

So he smiles himself and says, “Well, you have until sunup to look around to your heart’s content.”

He kind of hates the overly happy announcer voice he’s slipped into, but Spencer doesn’t know him well enough to tell – just smiles and gets up off the floor, his hand leaving behind a strangely cold patch on Brendon’s ribs.

 

* * *

 

Spencer’s hesitant at first, looking through the books differently now, gently touching spines instead of pulling them off the shelves if he dares to touch them at all. Brendon isn’t sure if it’s even possible to damage these books, but he has the feeling that announcing that wouldn’t really make Spencer any less ill at ease, so he keeps his mouth shut and his distance.

“This is so crazy,” he hears Spencer mutter more than once, and eventually he withdraws to the front of the bus and hunkers down in the driver’s seat, knees pulled up against his chest. When – not if – Spencer decides this is too much for him after all, Brendon really doesn’t want to be in his way.

He stares out the window instead, at the few late-night shoppers and the bum on the corner, shifting to get comfortable on a creased bit of cardboard. It’s all wrong. Spencer’s here and Brendon should be elated, and instead he’s up here, biting his nails and waiting for the moment when it all, inevitably, ends.

 

* * *

 

It does, eventually, but not the way Brendon is expecting. Instead he hears Spencer laugh, sudden and loud in the stillness of the book mobile, and he’s out of his seat and peering down the aisle before he has time to properly process what’s going on.

Spencer’s in the kids’ section again, a ratty edition of _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory_ in his hands, and when he sees Brendon, he waves him closer and shows him the inside cover: A picture of a young, pleased, Spencer-looking boy covered in chocolate, and the inscription _To Spencer, with Love. Mommy_

Spencer laughs to himself some more, folding the pages over, running his nail lightly over the stamp pressed too energetically opposite the title: _THIS BOOK BELONGS TO: Spencer J. Smith_.

“I totally forgot about this,” he says, grinning at Brendon. “I think it got lost during a move or on vacation or something. Man, I loved this thing.”

Brendon knows, of course. He knows every time Spencer went and read it, every day he had it read as his goodnight story – sometimes twice, back to back, when he was sick – and he’s seen the pages grow greyer and the creases bigger and bigger. But he’s not sure Spencer’s entirely over the whole thing yet, so he just smiles and pushes his glasses up his nose and doesn’t look away until Spencer, regretfully, replaces the book on the shelf.

Brendon kind of wants to go, to let Spencer have these experiences to himself, but he’s still rooted to the spot, considering, when Spencer suddenly makes a noise and practically _pounces_ on a book, although his hands when he pulls it from the row of its companions, are gentle and slow.

“I still have this,” Spencer tells him, holding the book out with both hands. “ _Man_ , I love this one.” He doesn’t even let Brendon get a good look at it, just pulls it close again and flips it open. He starts laughing to himself almost immediately, shaking his head in disbelief. “Oh man,” he says. “Oh man, oh man, oh man.”

Brendon smiles at that. He can’t help it – he loves when people enjoy books, and seeing Spencer so thrilled by something Brendon is a part of makes him want to glow with pride.

Maybe he makes a noise of some kind, because Spencer looks up suddenly and says, “You should look at this with me.”

Something hot spreads in Brendon’s belly. He comes slowly when Spencer beckons, easing into Spencer’s personal space with a kind of hyperawareness of how close they are, as if he can feel Spencer’s body heat despite the inches separating them.

“What’s – what’s the book?” he asks.

Spencer shoots him a look. “ _The Phantom Ship_. Frederick Marryat.”

When Brendon nods, he says, “It’s based on the legend of the Flying Dutchman. Philip – the protagonist – goes to save his father from his eternal punishment, only to lose his wife to the inquisition. It’s tragic, but kind of beautiful at the same time, you know?” He shakes his head, trailing his fingernail over an illustration of a ship caught in a raging storm. “I read a lot of this stuff as a kid,” he says after a moment, and adds, attention still held by the book, “I was kind of messed up as a fourteen-year-old.”

Brendon isn’t quite comfortable pointing out that Spencer still comes off as a little messed up in what he reads and writes. It’s not his job to judge, after all, and after the earlier scene, he’s leery of chasing Spencer off again.

So he smiles, shrugging the topic off. “Tea?” he asks instead.

Spencer nods without looking up, fingers tracing along the outside of the pages. Brendon leaves him to it, then, reaching instead for the water heater he’s got built into the storage space by the driver’s seat. He has two cups, even, that came with the bus and that Brendon had guarded carefully even though he’d lost faith somewhere along the line that he’d ever get to use them, and a handful of teabags. He glances back but Spencer’s so lost in his book that Brendon doesn’t want to disturb him. He goes with classic black instead, steeping it for a minute. He finds a strawberry-cream one for himself, one that smells like artificial flavoring the moment it’s soaked but that’s fine, he doesn’t mind.

He hasn’t smelled strawberries in years, so the artificial kind is at least a consolation prize.

When everything smells like fake berries and dairy and the liquid in Spencer’s cup is a dark, even brown, he gets rid of both teabags and returns to the stacks.

Spencer, cross-legged on the floor, nods his thanks absently when Brendon sets the cup and saucer down by his knee. He flips a page and bursts out laughing, turning the book to show a page covered in crayon marks. “Total artist at age four,” he says, grinning. It’s a stupidly gorgeous smile, and Brendon swallows, but Spencer doesn’t seem to notice.

“This is the shit,” he says. He puts the book down on his other side, where his tea isn’t, and reaches for another. It’s a picture book of Pocahontas, interactive, with some of the drawings blank for coloring in.

When Spencer flips through the pages, Brendon can see once again that some of the line-art is filled in neatly, usually next to a less coordinated version like perhaps a child and an adult were coloring together at the time.

And then there are pictures that are little more than scrawls, large loops too big to be contained by a single page, and Spencer grins while he runs his fingernails over the thick crayon strokes.

“I really hope Jackie becomes a famous artist one day so I can blackmail her with this,” he tells Brendon.

Jackie is the sister, one of them, Brendon knows that much, and also that she’s been accepted to some state school to attend their arts program. Spencer’s parents weren’t happy about it in the emails they sent Spencer, but Spencer had kindly reminded them that _he_ had gone all the way to Chicago to study, and that it wouldn’t be fair of them to intervene with his sister.

Brendon, who only vaguely remembers his own siblings and his interactions with them, can honestly say that he respects Spencer for that quite a bit.

Spencer impresses him. Always has, and that certainly is a reason why Spencer is Brendon’s favorite.

 

* * *

 

Brendon holds out for as long as he can, but eventually the coming day forces him into action.

Like he supposes Dracula must, he can feel the arrival of dawn like a physical ache, like reality – not Spencer’s reality, Brendon’s; just Brendon’s – has grown tired of watching him play and is now dragging him back down whether he wants it or not.

He sighs, quietly enough not to disturb Spencer. He doesn’t want to, he wants Spencer to stay for however long he’d like, but a quick glance out the window confirms what he already knew: Dawn is just a hair’s breadth away, and Brendon can’t not play by the rules of the game, so he allows himself a moment to pout to himself and then heads down the corridor, for Spencer. He stops a couple of shuffling steps away and waits for Spencer to notice, looks down at the crown of shiny hair with a strange ache in his heart.

“Hey,” Spencer says, smiling up at him.

“We’re closing soon,” Brendon says regretfully. He doesn’t want to, but the knowledge of the coming dawn has been growing ever more present in his mind, and he’s a Librarian. He can’t break the rules.

“Right,” Spencer says, face falling. He pushes the book he’s holding haphazardly back into its empty spot. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Brendon assures him. He offers a wan smile. “It was really nice to have you.”

Spencer shakes his head absently. “It’s been – bizarre,” he decides on, finally. “But really good. Fascinating, you know? I’m still not sure this place actually exists.”

“Join the club,” Brendon says, laughing, because it’s easy to lose track of reality inside the bus, he should know that better than anyone.

Spencer chuckles a little bit, but he’s also looking at Brendon curiously, gaze making Brendon distinctly uncomfortable, until he suddenly turns his head away and yawns.

“Sorry,” he says, around his hand, and gives Brendon a sheepish look.

“It’s late,” Brendon assures him, because it is. “Or very early. Trust me, I understand.”

“You would, wouldn’t you?” Spencer says quietly, and then smiles before Brendon can ask him what he means. He climbs to his feet, briefly groping around for his jacket, and makes his way over to where Brendon’s standing by the stairs.

Brendon tilts back his head to look up at him.

“Thank you,” Spencer tells him. “For tonight.”

“It’s been a pleasure,” Brendon assures him honestly.

Spencer leans in to briefly kiss his cheek, fleeting and dry, before he half-trips his way down the stairs. He hesitates at the bottom, staring back at Brendon, his jacket clutched tightly in one hand. “Will I see you again?” he asks, hesitantly, like something is actually riding on the answer, and that’s a thought that makes Brendon’s chest grow warm and tight.

So he smiles, and says, “I would assume so,” and Spencer doesn’t exactly look pleased with that answer, but he still smiles back.

“I’ll look forward to seeing you, then,” he says, and then smiles once more, eyes crinkling at the corners with the expression. He shrugs on his jacket against the four o’clock chill that even summer mornings have, waves once and walks away, growing steadily smaller as he passes parked car after parked car.

The stereo’s still warbling happily away. “Have you ever dreamed a night like this,” Brendon sings to himself, swaying from side to side next to the driver’s seat.

Down the street, Spencer turns and looks back, and when he sees that the bus is still there – probably sees Brendon standing there through the windshield – he lifts his arm and waves.

Brendon waves back enthusiastically, and hums “never dreamed, dreamed a night like this” to himself as he goes to shut the door.

 

* * *

 

Brendon’s bus library has other patrons. Spencer’s not the only person whose books are stored in Brendon’s little branch of the Central Library, that would make Brendon’s life very fruitless indeed. But none of them have ever come to see him, and while he knows their names – Jake, Maryon, Olivia, all of them – and shelves their readings, he can’t quite put a face with a collection. He sorts their newest readings whenever they arrive, no matter if it’s Katie who loves cheesy supernatural romance or Mattie who reads nothing but video game descriptions if he can help it. Some of them he’s had for far longer than Spencer, and some of them for only a few years, but Spencer is still his favorite.

Maybe it’s just that Spencer is, indeed, the only person Brendon’s spoken to since he first found himself behind the wheel of his Fleetwood, but there’s no use in denying it. He prefers Spencer’s collection to all the others, and he prefers Spencer to all the others. If he could, he would park his car in front of Spencer’s apartment and never ever leave again.

He can’t, though. Brendon’s got a boss, just like everyone, and the orders he gets are precise and leave no wiggle room. He has to visit all these people, ready for them to see him if they would only _open their eyes_ , and the morning after Spencer’s visit, he sets out for Nashville to tempt the Motown-obsessed Lorissa with a library of her very own. He spends a couple of days parked out next to the Country Music Hall of Fame, waiting for a knock or a look, _anything_. He’s more alert than ever now that he’s actually encountered one of his charges.

The most exciting thing that happens, though, despite some drunken fights that happen out in the lot with half-full beer bottles sailing harmlessly past the Fleetwood’s large windows, is a letter that arrives in _Smith, Spencer James_ ’ inbox. It’s written on the back of a spreadsheet print-out from possibly the nineties and goes like this:

> _Brendon,_
> 
> _I’m not positive this will work, but it should, right? You shelve everything I read, and everything I write, so if I write you a letter, you should get your hands on it. I don’t know if you read it all, of course, but you should. I am hereby giving you my explicit permission._
> 
> _Not that I have any way of knowing whether you’ll get this or not, of course. Maybe tomorrow I’ll go down to the post office and mail it off for real. 'To the night book mobile.' Give those guys something to laugh about._
> 
> _I’m still not sure if our encounter actually happened or not, but if not, then my brain certainly came up with more exciting stuff that night than usual. My very own library – that’s kind of bizarre, you have to admit. I can’t imagine having your job – don’t you get bored? I can’t imagine you do much besides read._
> 
> _But maybe I have it all wrong, and what you do is the best job in the world. It’s not like I can know. I didn’t even know you and your bus existed until a few days ago, after all. So forgive me if I sound patronizing, or dismissive. It was absolutely lovely to meet you, and to spend a few short hours on your (my?) bus._
> 
> _I hope we have a chance to meet again soon. There’s so much I haven’t asked you – so much I haven’t seen._
> 
> _Waiting faithfully,_
> 
> _Spencer Smith_

 

* * *

 

Brendon, with shaking hands, opens up a new subcategory: Section D, self-written. Letters: To Brendon.

He can’t make himself shelve it, let it go, yet, though. Not quite yet.

 

* * *

 

> _Hello, you,_
> 
> _Can you believe it’s been months since we met? So many months – Halloween’s over now, and Christmas, and New Year’s, and Easter’s coming up soon if the store decorations are to be believed._
> 
> _But first, and I don’t know if you know this, but you should: It’s Valentine’s Day today. I am dateless, as usual, because I refuse to let my friend Ryan fix me up. He even wanted me to come along on his date, but he’s clearly trying to get laid tonight, so he’d probably kill me if I actually said yes._
> 
> _I don’t know if this makes you uncomfortable, and if it does, I apologize. But ever since I met you, no one seems to be able to hold my interest. How can running a marathon on every continent compare to someone who drives my own personal library around the country? How can founding a non-profit organization ever be more fascinating than what you do?_
> 
> _If you happen to be in town, you should come by. I’d take you out to a nice swanky dinner to make up for all the questions I’ve thought of that I want to ask you. :P_
> 
> _Where are you now? I hope it’s nice, wherever you happen to be. Chicago’s managed to produce a couple of early flowers, even, which, after ten weeks of straight snow, has even the biggest winter enthusiasts all excited. I love it here, but I’m from Vegas, and it really shows in the winter. All my classmates make fun of me when I come in wearing five million layers, but that’s because they’re crazy._
> 
> _I picked a crocus for you today, and put it in a glass on my desk. I got teased for it quite a bit, and I think Cathy-the-girl-without-the-gaydar was kind of mad, but it was for you, so it was fine. I’d give you all the flowers in the world. I’d send you chocolates if I could, but I’m fairly sure it wouldn’t work. But I’m told intent is important, so please bear in mind that I would have made this day incredibly special for you, if I only could have._
> 
> _Fare well, my friend._
> 
> _Spencer_

 

* * *

 

Brendon doesn’t have a very challenging job. He doesn’t run any of the libraries, he just drives his bus, and whenever something arrives from the Central Library, he goes to put it in its proper place, shelves accommodating, taking him into whatever collection he needs to access.

It’s a simple enough task, considering no one ever disturbs the books or asks him for information.

The only thing he has to do all day, when he isn’t driving, is shelve the articles arriving from the Central Library. Sure, considering how much even the most average of his patrons reads, that keeps him perfectly busy for most of the day, but he still has plenty of time to himself. Time, perhaps, that he could spend perfecting his knowledge of Argus und Tiffany and Joe the way he has with Spencer. But while he’ll pick up a book they sloughed through if it looks interesting enough, he’d never presume to read every book they’ve ever touched, read along with them just to feel connected for a little while. Frankly said, they aren’t interesting enough for him to follow them.

It’s different with Spencer.

Spencer, he keeps track of. He knows the day Spencer gets a prescription for Zoloft, and the day Spencer actually goes to the pharmacy to pick it up, and the day the doctor advises him to double the dose. The others, he’s aware of in an abstract way: Michaela gets married, Suez is thinking about adoption, Dallon moves to Chicago. It’s all well and good. But while he files every document he receives for them as diligently as he always does, none of these development really matter to him unless they’re likely to bring him closer to Spencer.

He can’t, not even to himself, justify how strongly he’s gotten attached to someone he’s only met the once, but as much as that _should_ maybe bother him, it doesn’t. Spencer clearly feels the same, and while the amount of medication Spencer is on doesn’t really say anything flattering about his emotional state, it makes Brendon feel vindicated regardless.

It’s hard not to, considering how much time and energy Spencer spends on keeping Brendon up to date on the developments in his life – his friends, his classes, his family. For the first time since he got roped into doing this terrible job, Brendon has a life outside of other _living_ people. He has a life, not just a job to do. It’s like, with his letters, Spencer has given Brendon his own collection – his private little crawlspace in Spencer’s mind. Given him a purpose and an existence, given him something only Brendon has the right to. It’s a strange thought to have, that somehow, with his actions, Spencer is drawing him back into the land of the living, and Brendon’s not sure the Powers That Be approve.

But they can’t do anything about it, and that thought makes him spitefully gleeful. Spencer is bringing him back to life, and _they can’t stop it_. They’re just going to have to sit back and take it, because Spencer is Brendon’s patron, and the eagle-eyed watchers above can do nothing to separate them.

 

* * *

 

> _Hey, B. :)_
> 
> _Just a quick update – finally made it to culinary school. It’s not as great as I imagined, and a lot of stress, but still good. I imagine you’ll be shelving a lot of stuff about how to properly garnish vegetables in the future._
> 
> _As always, hope you’re well. Swing by sometime, when you’re in the neighborhood. :)_
> 
> _Love, Spence_

 

* * *

 

Brendon knows already, of course – he filed Spencer’s acceptance letter, and his email reply saying that he’d love to, and the billing for classes and all the official paperwork, but that’s not the same. He’s starting to distinguish in his head between the things he knows about Spencer because that’s just what he does, and what he knows about Spencer because Spencer told him. Maybe that’s pointless, trying to rectify his stalker existence by sugarcoating everything that doesn’t fit that lifestyle, but it _feels_ different to him. There are things Spencer shares with him just because he wants to, because he wants Brendon to know, thoughts and feelings that Brendon wouldn’t have access to otherwise.

It doesn’t even really matter that there are things that Spencer doesn’t want him to know – there are a couple of topics Spencer is markedly unhappy about, and whenever one of them comes up in a text and an email, Spencer’s reply will inevitably include asking to speak about it by phone only. Brendon can understand that. If he had had to grow used to the idea that someone else was aware of his every message, note, advertisement, dialed number, _everything_ , he’d probably resort to phoning people a lot, too. It’s not really his place to get mad about it.

He worries though. More than anything, he worries.

 

* * *

 

> _B ~_
> 
> _Family took me to Aspen for Spring Break because they’re worried about me. They tried to make it out to be about them missing me and shit, but I have eyes._
> 
> _But then they’re my family. It’s kind of in their job description, right? Just promise me you won’t be in Chicago while I’m gone, because then I’d have to hate them forever, and I’d really rather not._
> 
> _This is the cheesiest postcard I could find, btw, just because I could. Wish you were here X_
> 
> _Spence_

 

* * *

 

As sad as it may sound, Brendon kind of lives for Spencer’s letters. He doesn’t write back, but sometimes he will answer Spencer’s questions aloud while he’s reading, maybe hoping deep down that Spencer will feel that Brendon is thinking about him. Maybe he’ll sneeze, or his ears will burn, and he’ll remember Brendon and smile to himself. And it gives Brendon something to do, a way to keep himself sane in his solitude, replying ‘Yeah, fine,’ to Spencer’s written _How are you?_ and ‘oh, you know, shelving a little’ when Spencer asks him what he’s up to today. He dearly wishes that there was some way for Spencer to receive his answers, some way for Brendon to help Spencer feel less alone, but that’s not part of the job, apparently – he can know everything there is to know about his patrons, but he can’t ever be allowed to turn that knowledge into something useful. Something needed.

Brendon is pretty content with his existence most of the time – it’s not any worse than life before he became a Librarian, at the very least – but sometimes he hates his bosses so much it hurts.

 

* * *

 

> _My Brendon –_
> 
> _where are you now? Are you close, or far, far away? I think maybe you’re in Texas – is that true?_
> 
> _I promised you an update, so even though there’s nothing much to report, here it is:_
> 
> _Culinary school is strange, so far. It’s been fun, sure, even if the people are incredibly snobby sometimes. You should have seen their faces when I suggested we hit the hot dog stand across the street for lunch today – it was like I had announced that I’m the Antichrist._
> 
> _Although I don’t think they would have been very impressed by that, in the end._
> 
> _In any case, it’s going alright. I’m not the best by a long shot, but I’m also not the worst, and that’s what’s important, right? It could be going a lot worse. At least I can cook pasta like a motherfucking champ._
> 
> _Quite honestly – and don’t let my mother know this – I don’t think I’m cut out to be a chef._
> 
> _There are so many rules to learn, and everyone is on edge all the time – it’s worse than med school, from what I’ve heard tell of it._
> 
> _I cannot wait to get out of here. But at least thinking about you makes me smile._ :)

 

* * *

 

Brendon isn’t in Texas – he’s in Alaska, actually, parked behind a cinema in Fairbanks, but it’d be expecting too much to assume that Spencer could somehow have become psychic. The thought is nice, though, and somehow it takes hold, and for days afterwards, whenever Brendon passes by a particularly gorgeous landscape or drives into or away from an extraordinarily spectacular sunset, he shuts his eyes for the fraction of a second and thinks, as firmly as he’s able, _Spencer, I wish you were here._

 

* * *

 

The next letter comes when he’s in Oregon, feet propped up on the dash, watching crazy people try to surf in water that’s probably more icy slush than ocean. One of the tiny, wet-suited specs down there is Amanda, who’s on vacation with her husband and quite certainly insane, and Brendon doesn’t have high hopes that she’ll be inspired to pop into his library when her toenails have frozen, but that’s none of his business. He’s here because he was told to be here, and he’ll hang around until she gets back into her hatchback and goes.

So Spencer’s letter is quite the welcome distraction, really. Brendon fishes it out of the inbox with one hand, a college-ruled paper with a triangle missing at the bottom left-hand side where pre-perforated paper always tears.

> _Hello, my little road warrior_
> 
> _So now that Jon and Cassie are all serious, it’s apparently open season on Spencer’s love life. I told him so many times to let it go, but he won’t. Like going on dates with strangers is really going to solve anything._
> 
> _But at least he’s still talking to me. Ryan’s off in his own little world now – he always has been, but he’d at least include me some of the time. Now it’s the Ryan Show, all day, every day. It’s like he’s totally forgotten I followed him all the way out to Chicago. I don’t even know where he _is_ half the time._
> 
> _School, you know. Sucks._
> 
> _But at least I have you. Where are you? How are you doing? I wish these things could be less one-sided, but this is the best I can do for now._
> 
>  

* * *

 

On the margin of an article about food poisoning: _I’m definitely not cut out to be a chef._

 

* * *

 

> _Hi, you,_
> 
> _on a scale of 1 to 10, how pissed do you think people would be if I happened to mysteriously get lost on the way to school today? If I just never made it. Those buses can be tricky, you know._
> 
> _It’s just that everyone’s always telling us how much tougher an actual kitchen is going to be, and I feel like I’m already getting snapped at at every turn. If I’m already getting this much shit now, how the hell am I supposed to survive actual work?_
> 
> _But anyway. Apparently I’ve been slicing tomatoes wrong all my life – who knew?_
> 
> _Clearly, this is Tragic. There was lots of yelling and Frowny Disapproval and I couldn’t wait to get out of there and hide in the break room for a while._
> 
> _Do you think you’ll be back in town anytime soon? I think I could use a friendly ear._

 

* * *

 

Brendon’s Fleetwood is parked on the lower level of Michigan Avenue, out of the sleet coming down like the apocalypse is on its way. Brendon’s got his legs draped over the steering wheel and he’s leafing through an old copy of the _Times_ that Spencer’s read almost in its entirety – there are a _lot_ of articles, Brendon’s pretty impressed – when someone bangs on the door.

He almost tips off his seat, he’s so startled, and he looks over fully expecting to get mugged, but it’s Spencer. He has his hood pulled almost all the way into his eyes, and still, Brendon would know that grin anywhere.

He fumbles around with the ignition and the buttons and gets the door open, and then has to wait while Spencer struggles out of his soaked coat and climbs the bottom steps before he can launch himself at him and hug him.

Spencer laughs, maybe startled, but catches him neatly, gets his hands under Brendon’s thighs when Brendon wraps his legs around Spencer’s waist and maneuvers him up the stairs and into the bus.

“Hi,” he says, quietly, into Brendon’s ear. “Hello.”

“Hey,” Brendon returns just as quietly. He lets go only reluctantly, unlocking his legs and sinking to the ground, and it takes another few seconds before Spencer takes his arms away. He reaches up, briefly, to wipe stray rain from Brendon’s cheek, and then turns towards the stacks, eyes going wide.

“Shit,” he says. “Did I really read this much?”

“Yup,” Brendon says, trying to keep his voice enthusiastic and not as shaky as he really feels. “All you, my friend.”

“And you read it,” Spencer says, turning to give him a dark-eyed look. “You read them all, too, right?”

Brendon shrugs, looking away. “Not much else to do,” he says, voice still as light as he can make it.

“Yeah,” Spencer says. He keeps his eyes locked on Brendon for another few seconds before he says, “Do you still have the same hours?”

“I – yeah,” Brendon says, startled, even more so when Spencer beams at him.

“Fantastic,” he says. “Let me just cancel on my friend, and then I’m all yours ‘till sunrise.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Brendon protests, edging closer while Spencer’s already pulling his cellphone out of his pocket, heading for the bus stairs like that sight doesn’t make Brendon’s heart stumble in his chest.

“It’s fine,” Spencer tells him, smiling. He holds his hand out, and Brendon offers his automatically.

“You really think I found you again just to ditch you for a game and some booze?”

Brendon has no idea what it is that makes people rush past his bus, too preoccupied with their busy little lives to even notice him. But with Spencer, here, loosely entwining their fingers like there’s nothing at all to it, he doesn’t tell him any of that. Instead he smiles, and stands there on the steps in the cold with his free hand wrapped around his stomach for warmth while Spencer makes his excuses.

Whoever’s on the other end of the line doesn’t seem pleased to be dumped at such short notice, but Spencer makes reassuring noises, smiling at Brendon all the while.

“Ran into an old friend,” is all the explanation he offers. “I haven’t seen him in years, man, otherwise I wouldn’t bail on you. You know that, don’t you?”

He laughs at whatever that person says, says, “You know me: Mr. Reliable,” unaware of the summersaults happening in Brendon’s stomach. “Of course, yeah, I’ll call you. Next game night’s on me,” Spencer says, and slides his phone back into his jeans, giving Brendon the most brilliant smile.

“All yours until dawn,” he says.

Brendon can’t help the grin spreading over his face at that, and he pulls Spencer back up the stairs, into the warmth and comfort of the bus, with its warm lights and its shelter from the wind. He helps Spencer slide off his rain-dampened jacket and drapes it over the steering wheel, by Brendon’s little heater, to dry.

He nods his head towards the stacks when he catches Spencer looking, fascinated, with an indulgent smile. It must be so fascinating, to be in a place like this. He doesn’t doubt Spencer’s going to wander down the shelves looking out for the books he picked up ever since his last visit, wondering dimly if they’ll be appearing in Brendon’s book mobile, as well.

And they all have, Brendon has no doubt about that. Spencer has never been the most avid reader, although his tendency to at least begin books has certainly risen since his last visit, but it’s been several years since they last saw each other and there have been quite a few additions.

He closes the door while Spencer wanders off, smiling, and turns the stereo down while he’s at the controls already. By the time he’s taken a couple of deep breaths and composed himself, Spencer’s gone, disappeared around a bend. Brendon can still hear his shuffling footsteps on the carpet, though, so he just smiles to himself and tidies up a little, stashing away the books he reads while he waits and the abandoned crosswords he finishes in his head.

Outside the window, yellow lights are illuminating the pillars. There aren’t any cars, and if Brendon wanted to, he could pretend that he and Spencer were the only people alive. There’s no one around to break the illusion, sidewalks and streets deserted, and it feels a little bit like a blessing from above. Like they’re being granted a reprieve from the busy world, like they’re being offered one night’s sanctuary from reality.

 

* * *

 

He finds Spencer deep in the stacks, sitting cross-legged on the carpet in the ‘Other’ category. He’s looking through entry ticket stubs to fairs and amusement parks¸ laughing every once in a while. Sometimes he frowns, trying to remember, and then his expression clears and he beams at Brendon like it’s some sort of shared memory he’s thinking of and not just Brendon on the outside, looking in.

Brendon toes the ground for a moment, uncertain. He _wants_ to be a part of Spencer’s life, wants to be part of all those memories, and that’s not a good thought for him to have. So he focuses on what he knows, instead, and dredges up a smile. “Tea?”

“That sounds wonderful,” Spencer says.

So Brendon makes tea, and they sit on the carpet between the stacks and Spencer leafs through his books, pointing out scratch marks and notes, sharing memories, both good and bad. The book he nearly tore to pieces when his dad moved out for a while, the novel he abandoned when his grandpa died and could never make himself pick up again. The series of little girl books his sisters owned that Spencer read in secret when he had his first crush and didn’t know how to react to another boy making his heart pound.

He laughs when Brendon can’t quite hide his scowl, and then turns a little pink, and then offers his hand with his palm up for Brendon to take again. “I know how I feel about that now,” he says, and Brendon looks away, flushing, but doesn’t let go of his hand.

They’ve moved on to the doodle-covered books from Spencer’s Spanish classes by the time Spencer’s stomach growls, and Spencer shoots him a sheepish look even as he laughs.

“I guess that was pretty clear,” he says, rubbing lightly over his belly with his free hand. He quirks a smile. “How do you feel about Chinese?”

Brendon shrugs, which is the only honest answer he can give. He hasn’t had food – hasn’t felt the need for food – since he became a Librarian, and memories of his life before then have grown fuzzy in his head. He remembers his family, how much it hurt when they cut him off, the terror he’d felt the first time he’d kissed a guy. Those things, fear and joy and hurt and anger, they’ve withstood the test of time. It’s the rest of it, the taste of food or the feeling of the first spring sunshine on his face, that have grown hazy, nowhere near intense enough to survive decades and decades of solitude.

He’s distracted from his thoughts by Spencer stretching, long and high, shirt riding up to reveal a strip of belly. “Because I haven’t had dinner today, and man, am I _starving_.”

“I’m sorry,” Brendon says. “You should go eat something, you didn’t have to skip it for me.”

“I know I didn’t,” Spencer says, giving him a funny look. “I wanted to.”

Brendon fidgets under Spencer’s gaze, but he manages to smile a little. “Chinese sounds fine.”

“Excellent,” Spencer says. “That means I can win you over with the best Chinese take-out joint this town has to offer. They deliver to random busses parked on street corners, right?”

Brendon shrugs again, helplessly, because how would he know? It’s not like he can actually interact with the world out there.

Spencer doesn’t seem to notice his suddenly glum mood, though, or maybe he’s just trying to cheer Brendon up, because he pushes the stack of little books aside and says, “I haven’t had dinner yet – I was going to go grab some burgers with my friend Jon, but then I ran into you.”

He grins, cheeks dimpling, so Brendon knows not to apologize again.

“Knock yourself out,” he says instead, which is apparently as good as giving Spencer permission to dig out his cell and wander towards the doors. “No reception,” he says, frowning at the display, but he looks up and smiles when Brendon squeezes past him to open up the door.

He doesn’t go far, just stands right in front of the bottom step like he’s worried Brendon might leave him there, phone pressed against his ear and eyes on Brendon, who can feel his cheeks heat under the scrutiny.

“Yeah, hi,” Spencer says suddenly, when Brendon is about to turn away himself, and adds, “I’d like to order for delivery? Yeah? Great, thanks.”

He drums his fingers against the side of the bus. “Can I get a… Chicken Fried Rice, please, and an order of Broccoli Beef, number 52, Orange Chicken, egg rolls, and Wonton soup. And rice on the side. Oh, and baked banana, please.”

He hums quietly, fingers still twitching, before whoever seems to come back on the line and he straightens again.

“Great,” Spencer says. “Cash, if that’s cool? Yeah, I’m not at home – I’m at Michigan and Illinois, you know, lower level? There’s an RV,” he says, trailing off when Brendon shakes his head. He frowns a bit, but Brendon just shakes his head again.

“Never mind,” Spencer tells the guy on the phone. “Just, come to that corner, okay? I promise I’ll be there.”

Brendon can tell from the tone of voice that he can pick up that the other person isn’t pleased, but they don’t disagree, and Spencer’s got a pleased grin on his face when he hangs up.

“You ready for some fantastic take-out?” he asks, holding his arms out for Brendon to lean into. It’s the farthest Brendon’s ever gone from the bus, and Brendon’s stomach does a queasy flip as he does so, even if he can’t tell for sure why.

Spencer remains oblivious to Brendon’s inner turmoil though, just props him upright against his own body while he climbs the steps. They end up just about nose to nose, and Spencer grins.

“Hi,” he says.

“Hello,” Brendon returns softly.

“Man, I’ve missed you,” Spencer says, spinning him in place a little bit, like Brendon used to do with his nieces. He sets him down and meets his eyes, bites his lips and looks away. “That’s lame, huh? Missing someone you barely even know?”

“Who am I to judge?” Brendon asks, gesturing at the deserted stacks to distract from what he isn’t saying: That he _wouldn’t_ judge, because he finds that very thought _thrilling_. He _wants_ Spencer to miss him. He _wants_ Spencer to think of him every minute of every day.

Spencer still doesn’t look at him, though. “I hope the food gets here fast,” he says instead. He lays one large, worn hand over his stomach. “I’m starving all of a sudden, man.”

Brendon smiles vaguely. He doesn’t remember food. He doesn’t remember _hunger_. He thinks that’s one of those things that would be too much for Spencer to comprehend, though, so he reaches for Spencer’s hands before his frown can turn into an actual question.

“Your hands are really clean,” he says. It sounds dumb, but they really are – calloused and with burn marks here and there, but neatly manicured and soft. Brendon doesn’t even do anything that could get his hands dirty, and even _his_ fingers don’t look this nice.

Spencer’s eyes soften. “Can’t have dirty hands as a chef,” he says, smiling a bit. “The customers might well revolt.”

Brendon smiles in return, imagining the dinner crowd staging an uprising, armed with salad forks and mood candles.

“What?” Spencer asks.

Brendon shakes his head.

A moment later, Spencer pulls his hand away, but gently, like his goal isn’t to tell Brendon to back off. “I’ve been on my feet all day, I’m exhausted,” he says, nodding behind Brendon. “Wanna sit?”

“Yeah, sure,” Brendon says.

They turn the stereo down low so they can hear the delivery car arrive and sprawl out in the entryway, knees touching. Brendon sings along to The Beatles’ _Rain_ out of habit, only faltering when he catches sight of Spencer grinning wildly at him, but Spencer just waves away his questioning look.

“Keep going,” he says. He leans back against the side of the driver’s seat, settling in comfortably, and never once takes his eyes off Brendon.

Brendon doesn’t want to, he wants to stop now, feeling self-conscious and weird, but Spencer just gives him an encouraging smile until he starts up again, quieter this time. A whole bunch of songs go by, and sometimes Spencer even, very quietly, joins in, but it still seems like no time at all has passed when headlights light up the silent street and a car turns the corner.

Spencer springs to his feet, smiling. “Take-out time,” he says. He hops down the stairs with a grin, fumbling for his wallet as he goes.

Brendon smiles after him helplessly. Spencer doesn’t notice though, waving to the guy in the tiny Fiat with the bright red ads on the side, nodding furiously when the driver frowns.

Still, the car heads straight for them and parks a couple of feet away.

“Delivery?” he asks, and when Spencer nods happily, he pops the trunk and pulls out a couple of plain white plastic bags.

While he’s occupied, Spencer shots Brendon a grin. An enormous, pleased-with-himself grin that would make Brendon smile back even if he wasn’t so damn happy to see Spencer, and Spencer lights up even more at that.

The delivery dude isn’t so happy. Brendon can see the guy frowning, looking around surreptitiously, no doubt wondering what Spencer’s doing out here all by himself without so much as a jacket. Spencer is pretty happy not to care, though, from the looks of things, humming as he sorts through his wallet. It gives Brendon this strange little jolt, that Spencer is so invested in sharing this with him.

Spencer waits until the delivery guy is back in his car and speeding away before he turns and climbs the bus steps with his prize, stopping for a moment when the tips of his shoes are nudging Brendon’s. He grins down at him.

“Dinner’s ready,” he says.

“Oh, thank you, honey,” Brendon says, with a grin of his own. He sits up reluctantly, pants fabric dragging over the rough carpet, and says, after a second, “It’s always nice to come home to warm food after a long day of work.”

Spencer’s eyes light up at that. “Yeah, so how does that work, exactly?” he asks, plastic bags hanging off both wrists. “This bus thing. You just drive around the country, collecting books?”

It’s a lot, lot more complicated than that, but Brendon doesn’t want to get into the nitty-gritty details of it, partly because he doesn’t really understand it all himself. He’s just a Librarian – it’s not like he runs the Central Library, or anything.

“It’s – kind of,” Brendon says, reaching up to take the bags off Spencer. “I don’t collect them, though. I get them from the Central Branch. They’re the ones in charge of all that.”

“Where’s the Central Branch?” Spencer asks. He fishes one of the cardboard containers out and sets it aside, digging for the plastic cutlery underneath. He looks up when Brendon snorts, brows furrowing, and says, “You don’t know?”

“I don’t,” Brendon says. “I don’t go by there and pick them up, or anything. That’s not how it works.”

“How does it work, then?” Spencer asks, frowning again when Brendon shrugs helplessly.

“You work for them, you have to know these things.” He hesitates. “Can I take my shoes off?”

“Yeah, sure,” Brendon rushes to assure him, and, after a moment’s hesitation, goes to follow suit.

They leave their sneakers on the top step of the stairs and settle down in the entryway, next to Brendon’s driver seat, Spencer spreading napkins and cardboard plates around while Brendon sets out the white containers in a neat little row.

“I don’t understand everything,” Brendon says, halting, after a while. “The guys at the Central branch run everything. I just drive.”

“And keep track of everything I read,” Spencer says.

Brendon nods. “And that. I read it, too, you know. Like you asked. When I get bored.” It’s a bit of a lie, but whatever. What Spencer doesn’t know won’t hurt him. He ducks his head when Spencer gives him a weird look, though, deflecting with, “I’m bored a lot.”

“I can’t tell you how much stalker potential this has,” Spencer says, swallowing his spoonful of food before he shakes his head.

“Oh, I know,” Brendon tells him, grinning. “You haven’t paid your Comcast bill yet, by the way.”

“Shit,” Spencer says, looking around wildly for a second before he catches Brendon’s eye again and starts laughing. “Oh my God, that’s so creepy.”

“I know,” Brendon says. He’s smiling fondly, he can tell, but he doesn’t seem to be able to stop. “To put your mind at ease, though, it’s not like I can do anything with that information.”

“Still,” Spencer says. He doesn’t seem too bothered though, happily breaking open the carton of orange chicken. He offers some to Brendon with a cock of his head, and lobs a couple of pieces onto Brendon’s plate when Brendon holds it out.

“There should be wine with this,” he says. “New Zealand Riesling, I think.” He smacks his lips, and when he looks up to find Brendon staring at him, he just grins. “Culinary school’s got to be good for something, right?”

“I’m a little surprised you eat take-out at all,” Brendon confesses, taking one of the white plastic forks with the bendy tips when Spencer offers them. “Shouldn’t it be all curried scallops and, I don’t know, foie gras for you?”

He probably pronounces it wrong, he can tell from the smile Spencer quickly tries to hide, but Spencer doesn’t call him on it.

“I actually like fast food a lot,” he says. “Sure, Chauteaubriand and lobster thermidor are all well and good when you’re in the mood, but there’s no hangover cure like McDonald’s, you know?” He looks up from the rice he’s spooning onto his plate and presses his finger to his lips. “Don’t tell my classmates though, okay? They already think I’m some kind of lesser creature.”

He’s grinning, still, so Brendon does as well, even though he kind of suspects that Spencer isn’t exaggerating his true feelings by much. He says, “Oh, please,” when Spencer holds out a container of noodles and digs them out of the container, creating a mountain on top of his rice and chicken that he takes a moment to admire before he jabs his fork into it and opens his mouth wide, hoping. He manages to get most of the food in, too, only a couple of noodles dropping into his lap, and he even manages to swallow before Spencer’s snickering infects _him_ , as well, and he ends up choking on his food.

Spencer takes pity on him, launching into a story about how his friend Regan almost picked a fight with the head chef at Anteprima while Brendon eats. It distracts Brendon from the oddity of eating real, actual food again in such a long time, and even when he’s not snickering over Spencer’s snobby culinary rookie acquaintances, he finds himself watching Spencer talk anyway, following the amused tilt of his head and the way his gestures reinforce his words.

He looks away when Spencer’s done, just briefly, because he’s not sure how much of what he’s feeling is showing in his eyes. Clearing his throat, he says, “So you spend a lot of time with your friends? I wasn’t sure from your letters.” He makes a face, not sure yet if there’s a line here that he’s overstepping. But then Spencer likes to tell him intimate details about his life, after all, and doesn’t that kind of make these things Brendon’s business?

Spencer gives him a quick look, swallowing. “I go out a lot,” he confesses after a long, silent moment. “Even when I’m not in the mood, because I can’t bear the thought of missing you while I stay in.”

Brendon doesn’t quite know what to say to that, so he’s both grateful for and displeased by his mouthful of food.

Spencer glances at him quickly, and then away again, fingering the back of his neck. “That must sound pathetic, huh? To be so obsessed with this – this place you’ve only been once?”

Brendon shrugs. He can’t think of anything to say that would rightly make Spencer feel better, because really, he’s going to think Brendon is biased regardless. He forks some chicken into his mouth to have an excuse for staying silent, though – he doesn’t want to make Spencer feel bad, either, after all.

After a quiet moment, Spencer follows suit, and they eat in silence, the sounds of bendy plastic prongs scraping against cardboard the only noise in the bus. Brendon puts his plate down when it’s still half full, too unused to food to eat much, and clears his throat when Spencer gives him a curious look.

“It could be worse,” he says. “My bus is pretty fabulous, after all. Add some feather boas and you’d pretty much have a pride parade float.”

Spencer laughs. It’s still not quite right, the sound, but a lot more genuine than it was before, and he reaches out for Brendon’s hand again. He doesn’t hold it this time, just gives it a quick squeeze before going to push their used packaging into an untidy pile.

“I think I’d like to look at the books some more, if you don’t mind?”

“Of course not,” Brendon says, pulling the cartons away from him. “Go on, I’ve got this.”

Spencer hesitates, but the lure of the books appears to be too great, and after another encouraging nod and smile from Brendon, he springs to his feet and disappears between the stacks.

Brendon stays sitting down a moment longer, listening to Spencer’s footsteps fade along the carpet. The rice is sticky and thick in his throat.

Unable to sit around and wait, wait around for that feeling that’s creeping up on him, to hit him all the way, he kneels up and starts to gather up all the containers, collecting the food that’s still good in one _Thank you_ bag and trash in the other. He dumps the latter and leaves the other by the door with their shoes, for Spencer to take with him when he goes. Because he’ll go, and it’s not even that much longer before he’ll have to leave, so Brendon clears his throat decisively and goes to find him, because he’d never forgive himself for missing out on time he could have spent with Spencer because he was bothered by a _feeling_.

“Spencer?” he calls, treading on soft feet along the carpet.

“Hey,” Spencer says, right next to him in an empty hallway, and Brendon’s heart gives a terrified lurch before he catches sight of Spencer one row over, eyes just barely visible over the tops of the Boxcar Children series.

“I forgot I read half this stuff, seriously,” Spencer says. “It’s a lot of memories, so that’s weird.” He holds up a book, too quickly for Brendon to recognize it. “And then some of them I look at and wonder what the hell I was thinking.”

“Don’t we all,” Brendon says, grinning.

“Is this really what you wanted to do with your life?” Spencer asks, looking at him through the shelves. “I mean, you’re such an outgoing guy, I can’t imagine you’d really be happy with nothing but books around you all day.”

Brendon has to turn his head away a little bit, because Spencer has no way of knowing how right he is. He swallows, and blinks, and then says, “Not _really_ , really. Most of the time I wanted to be a musician – you know, the beer, the girls, the guitar riffs every night. Living the rock star life.”

He looks down the empty corridors, the wildly colored spines staring wordlessly back at him. “Guess it just goes to show, doesn’t it?”

“What does it go to show, Brendon?” Spencer asks him quietly, but Brendon doesn’t know what to tell him, so he doesn’t say anything.

“What about you?” he asks instead. “Was it always a career as a chef for you?”

Spencer laughs. “Nope,” he says. “I wanted to be an astronaut, until they decided that that was outdated. I wanted to go to Mars. I was gonna find the guys who kidnapped Mulder’s sister and kick their ass.” He grins at Brendon, unselfconscious and wide, and Brendon manages to smile back at him.

“I even tried out for astrophysics so I could join NASA, but turns out you kind of have to be a genius for that, so. My only other hobby was stress baking, so my mom suggested I go into some culinary arts program instead.” He laughs a little. “That’s lame, huh? Choosing a career based on what your mom told you?”

“I wanted to be a librarian when I was little,” Brendon says. “I mean, of course I also wanted to be a train conductor and a vet and that guy on _Man VS. Wild_ , but the librarian thing wasn’t as much of a fluke as everyone thought it would be. And for a while, I read everything I could get my hands on. And I mean everything, my mom had to drag me away from every advertisement we passed.”

He gives Spencer a wry look. “The librarian thing I got over eventually, but the reading thing stuck. My parents were pretty religious and really strict, so I didn’t get to do much and I read all the time, because books were the one thing I could get away with. They were so happy I didn’t run off to be a skater that anything involving sitting in my room and not making a huge racket was cool with them.”

“That sounds – lonely,” Spencer says.

Brendon shrugs, looking away. It was, and it wasn’t – he wasn’t the most popular guy in school, anyway, and at least the characters in his books didn’t smack his books out of his hands on their way down the hall. When he was reading, he could imagine himself as fun and successful and popular in a way real life never quite allowed him to be.

“It was fine,” he says, in the end. “Not nearly as bad as it sounds.”

Spencer nods slowly. He keeps his eyes on Brendon for another long moment before he turns away, disappearing from Brendon’s view and leaving him with nothing to look at but more books, neatly lined up despite their mismatched sizes and topics. A moment later, he turns the corner and heads back towards him.

“I’m good now,” he says, meeting Brendon’s curious look. “Wanna sit down again?”

“Sure,” Brendon says, puzzled. He’d always figured that when someone entered something as clearly magical and kind of freaky as the book mobile, they would actually want to look at books while they were there, but Spencer doesn’t seem to agree with that.

Sure, he pulls a toddler book with the sewn-in fabrics for a full sensory experience from the shelf, but it seems like nothing more than an unconscious action so he can have something to do with his hands as he sits, turning it over and over between his fingers without even looking at it.

Instead, he stares at Brendon for a long, long time before he says, slowly, “Will you tell me about becoming a librarian?”

Brendon looks away, swallowing. He’d rather not, because it’s really not his favorite memory, but this is Spencer, and Brendon really doesn’t think that he can say no to him.

He stays quiet regardless, for what is probably a long enough timespan to be rude, which is when Spencer brushes his index finger against Brendon’s knee and says, softly, “Please.”

“I died,” he says, before he can talk himself out of it.

Spencer startles, clearly not expecting that little tidbit of information. He doesn’t say anything though – just waits for Brendon to continue at his own speed.

“I was living in Arizona at the time,” Brendon says. He takes a deep breath. “Wasn’t talking to my family. School was going badly, and my girlfriend had left me, and I didn’t have any friends, so one night I drove out into the dessert with a bottle of Jack and got really drunk and ran my car off the road and died.”

He shrugs, even though the memory, despite the haze of alcohol, is pretty terrifying: that feeling of being lifted into the air, the crunch of metal, the glass shards slicing into his skin.

“And when I blanked back in, I was in this library, this huge, huge, huge library, and this guy is telling me that I work for them now.”

He spread his hands, indicating the rows of books on either side of them. “And here I am.”

“That’s kind of disturbing,” Spencer says, nudging Brendon’s shoulder with his own. “I hope you know that.”

Brendon chuckles weakly. “Which part is that, exactly?”

“ _All_ of it,” Spencer says, with the kind of incredulous look that implies he’s not really kidding. “You being punished for being suicidal, for one.”

“I wasn’t suicidal.”

Spencer doesn’t argue, but he _is_ wearing a look that clearly communicates, ‘yeah, right,’ so Brendon shakes his head.

“I didn’t like, set out to kill myself, or anything like that. But I think maybe I knew what I was doing in the back of my head, because I think you only end up in the library if you off yourself. I mean, I’m not sure, of course, but I feel like they told me something like that.”

“They?” Spencer echoes hesitantly. “There’s more of you?”

Brendon nods slowly. “I haven’t seen that many,” he says. “There was really only one guy telling me what to do. But there have to be more of us. There are so many readers, there have to be more book mobiles going around than just me.”

Spencer nods slowly, eyes distant, before he shakes his head and smiles widely at Brendon. “How did we get on such a depressing topic?” he asks, but his cheer is forced, Brendon can tell. “Let’s talk about something else.”

“Sure,” Brendon says, relieved.

“Anything in particular?” Spencer asks him.

It just figures that they’d end up playing this particular game. Brendon feels like he could talk to Spencer – about everything and nothing – for hours, the two of them happily jumping from topic to topic without ever having to pause for breath. But now, with the subject change hanging over them like the sword of Damocles, he can only shrug and pulls his lower lip between his teeth.

Spencer smiles weakly at him, looking about as self-conscious as Brendon feels at the moment, but that only lasts until Spencer tilts his head up. “Is that _Summer Wine_?” he asks, frowning.

It takes Brendon a moment to catch on to the fact that, yes indeed, that _is_ Nancy Sinatra crooning from the stereo. He glances over automatically, and when he looks back, Spencer is staring at him with this really odd look on his face.

“I’m really glad you’re here, Brendon,” he says, before Brendon can ask him what’s the matter. “There’s so much that’s getting away from me, sometimes it feels like my entire life is just sand slipping through my fingers. But with you, I can imagine that you aren’t just going to screw me over. You’re the one thing in my life that I can rely on, the one person who won’t ever hurt me.”

He scooches closer, reaching for Brendon’s hand, and continues while Brendon, struck silent, is still staring at him.

“Writing those letters to you… I’m not sure how far I would have come if I hadn’t been able to do that. I know it’s not fair because it’s not like you can talk back, but I feel like I can tell you anything. I’ll write it down and then you’ll know and you won’t ever judge me for it.”

Brendon wants to tell him _yes_ , tell him that he wouldn’t ever judge Spencer, not in a million years, but when he looks up Spencer’s really close and his eyes are shiny and blue and the words just dry up in Brendon’s throat.

“It’s like you’re my best friend,” Spencer says, ever so quietly.

Brendon swallows, loud in the quiet with only the stereo playing softly somewhere up at the front of the bus, but he doesn’t turn away when Spencer kisses him.

It’s just a simple kiss, lips against lips for the briefest of moments before Spencer draws away again. He doesn’t look worried, really, just a little apprehensive, so Brendon leans in and kisses him, this time, kisses his smiling mouth like he’s wanted to for so long.

They kiss for what seems like hours, kiss for ages before so much as a tongue comes into play, and even though there’s a part at the back of Brendon’s mind that wants to move on, hurry this up before dawn comes and ruins it all, he can’t bring himself to rush things along. It feels too right for that. It feels like everything he’s ever wanted, and from the soft, pleased noises Spencer makes every time he moves in for more, Brendon would guess he feels the same.

He goes willingly when Spencer urges him down, laying him out on the rough carpet. Spencer’s palms skim over Brendon’s torso, rucking up the fabric there, and then slip underneath, moving hot and heavy across his skin. He crooks his fingers and digs his fingernails briefly into Brendon’s ribs, too certain to feel ticklish, and then trails down again, down to the waistband of his jeans and then along it to where he’s resting on the carpet.

Brendon sucks in a startled breath at the sensation. Above him, Spencer grins, distracted but pleased, leaning in to press another brief kiss to his lips. Brendon kind of can’t help arching into that; it’s been so long, way, _way_ too long, Spencer’s lips soft and sweet against his skin despite the way his beard worries at Brendon’s cheeks. Brendon can just imagine how that might feel on the inside of his thighs, Spencer drawing his jeans and underwear down, and he flushes hotly, turning his face away.

“What?” Spencer asks breathlessly.

When Brendon shakes his head, he reaches out and turns him towards Spencer with a steady hand on his jaw. “No, come on, tell me.”

“You’re hot,” Brendon tells him. It comes out mostly as a groan, but whatever. He’s past caring what Spencer might think of his tone – especially since it’s fairly obvious Spencer feels the same.

“Why thank you,” Spencer says, grinning, and pushes Brendon’s shirt up to his nipples. He leans in and presses a kiss to Brendon’s abdomen, and then another one, detouring briefly to waggle his tongue into Brendon’s bellybutton, which is weird enough to make Brendon laugh.

Spencer glances up to grin at him in response, and then diverts his attention to unbuttoning Brendon’s jeans.

Brendon’s stomach jolts sharply at that. It’s been so long since anyone’s touched him, touched him at all, and to see Spencer’s clever fingers making short work of his button and zipper is doing all sorts of crazy things to his insides. He drops his head back onto the carpet and stares up at the ceiling instead, at the rows of books bearing silent witness, only startling up sharply when Spencer nips sharply at the waistband of his briefs, letting the elastic snap against his skin.

“No falling asleep,” he chides.

“Uh-huh,” Brendon manages, nodding.

Spencer grins at him then, quick and delighted, before tugging Brendon’s jeans and underwear down to his knees. It startles him a bit, and it can’t be the easiest maneuver with Brendon lying down the way he is, but Spencer’s determined and he manages, throwing Brendon a wink when he cranes his head up.

A moment later he leans in and nudges Brendon’s awakening dick with the tip of his nose, just teasing for a second before he opens his mouth and swallows Brendon down. Brendon groans, the heel of his shoe dragging across the carpet as he kicks his legs. His hands find the top of Spencer’s head almost automatically.

Brendon wasn’t completely inexperienced when he died. Part of him moving out to Arizona and as far away from his family as he could manage was so he could go hook up with whoever he wanted without it getting back to them, so he’s had experience. Some experience. But it was never a lot, and it’s been years and years, and this is _Spencer_ who’s kind of the most important person Brendon’s ever had in his life, and it feels _so good_.

Brendon never wants it to end.

 

* * *

 

They never even get around to taking their clothes off all the way. Spencer has his pants unbuttoned and Brendon’s jeans and underwear are caught halfway down his thighs, and Brendon should probably be a little more worried about the carpeting but who cares, really, when he’s got Spencer right here at his fingertips? When there’s Spencer, mumbling and moaning and shaking apart under his hands?

They’re both sweaty and flushed, and kind of disgusting, but Brendon still pulls Spencer close and kisses his forehead and mouths apologies into his hair. He’d give Spencer the world, if he could.

He cards his fingers through Spencer’s sweat-damp curls instead, fingering the soft skin at the nape of his neck. Spencer’s heavy, but it’s a comfortable weight: warm and comforting. Spencer’s smiling to himself, playing with the buttons on Brendon’s shirt, just tugging lightly. It’s Brendon’s only shirt, so he’s kind of tempted to tell him to be careful, but then he’s worn nothing else since he became a Librarian, and it’s still in just as good a condition. He thinks that perhaps it might be immune to mistreatment.

He firms up his hold on Spencer’s neck when Spencer laughs quietly, smiling himself as he asks, “What?”

Spencer shakes his head though. “’M just happy,” he says. He leans in and pressed a kiss to the V of skin showing off Brendon’s collarbones. “Happy to be here.”

He lays his head back down after that, which is seriously a good thing, considering Brendon has no idea what his face must look like. Despite the rush of adrenaline in his belly, he can’t come up with a suitable reply. He can’t even breathe.

Spencer doesn’t notice – he falls asleep not too long after, and Brendon’s too awake and too afraid of missing anything to do the same, but he dozes off a little, one hand on the back of Spencer’s head, watching his eyelashes flutter in sleep.

When he comes to with a start, it’s still dark down where they are, as dark as it had been when Spencer knocked on his door, but he can feel the night waning. Not much longer now and he’s going to have to let Spencer go, give him up again for who knows how long. It’s that thought that makes him clutch at Spencer’s shoulders so hard the skin turns white under his fingertips, and Spencer may not understand exactly what is going through Brendon’s head, but he makes a little noise and squeezes him back just as hard.

Brendon holds him as long as he can, as long as he can make himself, before the draw of the coming day makes him ease back. He isn’t counting on Spencer following him though, leaning in to kiss him again, and as it turns out, he’s kind of defenseless against that.

“I know I’ll have to go soon,” Spencer says when he pulls away. His voice is quiet, like maybe it’ll be less true if no one can hear. “I don’t want to, but I will.”

Brendon nods unhappily. It’s not like he wants Spencer to go, either. If he’s honest with himself, he wants to keep Spencer on this bus, safe from the dangers of time, forever.

“I want to do everything to you,” Spencer confesses in a whisper. “I keep thinking that I don’t know how long it’ll be before I see you again, and then I just can’t keep my hands off you.” He kisses Brendon again, hotly. “I want to know all the ways you taste before I have to let you go.”

“I’ll come back,” Brendon says. It’s a stupid promise to make, one he’s fairly certain he can’t keep, not in any reasonable amount of time, but it doesn’t matter. The only thing that’s important is seeing Spencer smile like that, big and wide and pleased, and then lean down so Brendon can twist his hands into Spencer’s hair and pull him down to kiss him again, again and again and again, until his lips are chapped and raw and the rest of Spencer’s body becomes too enticing to keep away from.

 

* * *

 

The minutes run by too quickly, like sand in an hourglass, and this time, despite Spencer’s teeth and lips and fingers on him, Brendon can’t forget. Daylight is calling him, growing more insistent with every second, with every fumbled touch.

This time, when Spencer looks up at him with his forehead flushed and his eyes dark, Brendon leans down to kiss his forehead.

“You have to go now,” he tells him, voice small.

“Right,” Spencer says. He smiles, but his eyes have a bit of shine to them, and Brendon has to bite his lip to keep from making useless promises: That he’ll stay, he’ll leave the bus and go live on Spencer’s couch and keep him entertained whenever he’s home. Truth be told, he doesn’t even think he _can_ leave the bus. Sometimes the thought pops into his head but he’s never actually tried, and maybe that’s a sign, some sort of failsafe to keep the Central Library’s workers from just running away. That maybe his mind won’t go there; that kind of thing. He can contemplate the idea, sure, but whenever it hints at becoming more than just a thought, his very nature or the bus or some creepy Master Librarian obliterates it from his mind.

So he reaches out and cups Spencer’s cheek, swallowing when Spencer leans into the touch, eyes slipping closed.

“I’ll always be here,” he says. “Reading what you read. Hearing what you hear. Okay? I’m not ever going to abandon you.”

Spencer nods. It still seems to take an eternity before he pulls away, gets his shoes on, takes one unsteady step down the stairs and then another one. It’s a bit more of a stretch to get down onto the pavement, but Spencer is tall enough that it doesn’t bother him. He’s holding onto Brendon’s hand like it’s a lifeline, but Brendon can’t be the one to pull away this time. He can’t. His entire life is Spencer, and Spencer is the one who has to let him go.

He does, after a while, when Brendon can already feel the pull of sunlight like a physical ache. He takes a step back, and then another, without ever taking his eyes off Brendon, and it takes everything Brendon has to do the same, to climb behind the steering wheel and turn the key to let the engine sputter into life.

The Fleetwood crawls forward slowly, seemingly just as reluctant to leave Spencer behind as Brendon is.

On the other side of the door, visible through the glass panes, Spencer lifts his hand in greeting. He’s utterly serious, and while Brendon tries to smile, the expression feels foreign and inappropriate on his face.

He can’t fake happiness right now.

He turns the radio down so low he can hear nothing save for the occasional high note and the hum of the engine, and concentrates on that while he eases the bus out onto the road. He manages to keep from looking into the mirror until he’s stopped at the nearest light, but then his eyes flicker over without his consent, seeking out that familiar figure.

He can still see Spencer standing there, at the corner of Michigan and Illinois, watching Brendon drive away. He’s too far away for Brendon to make out his expression, but there’s something about the hunch of his shoulders, the dip of his head, that makes Brendon’s heart clench and his throat uncomfortably tight.

 

* * *

 

Spencer’s next letter comes a couple of days later, when Brendon’s on the I-65 down to Florida, somewhere between Louisville and Elizabethtown. Brendon was honestly kind of worried that Spencer wouldn’t write to him anymore, that the thrill would be gone, because Spencer usually doesn’t go this long without letters – at least not unless he’s really not in a good place.

Heart pounding, Brendon pulls over at the nearest rest station he sees, which takes him way too long to get to. He grabs the letter out of his inbox before the engine’s even calmed down all the way.

It’s in Spencer’s usual terrible handwriting, and an actual letter, not just a hurried note.

> _Hey, hottie,_ it reads.
> 
> _You have no idea how happy I was to see your bus there, behind those pillars. I’ve been waiting for you to come back to me for so long, I almost didn’t believe that it was actually you I was seeing. But it was and you were just as sweet and fun and charming as I remembered you, and I was so,_ so _happy to see you._
> 
> _I wish you hadn’t had to go so soon, but I guess that’s just the way the world works, isn’t it? You find something amazing only to have to let it go again a moment later._
> 
> _It should probably feel more romantic, shouldn’t it? To be starcrossed. All the movies and books and songs make it seem so great, like that’s something everyone should aspire to. Who doesn’t want to be Romeo and Juliet, right?_
> 
> _None of them ever mention how much it sucks. Nobody ever talks about how painful it is to have to let that person go. How it feels to know that you won’t ever get to have them._
> 
> _I wanted to tell you then, but I didn’t dare. You can’t tell me no anymore, though, so here it is: You mean so much to me. I think about you all the time, even when I should be thinking about scallops and braised lamb and all that useless, worthless shit. You’re the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing I think about at night, and if that means getting yelled at in the kitchen sometimes because I’m distracted by the thought of you, then that’s worth it._
> 
> _You will never not be worth it._

 

* * *

 

As sad as it is to say, the world keeps on turning. Brendon slept with Spencer, and he stood there the next morning praying to every deity he could think of that he might get to keep Spencer for a little while longer. But he didn’t, and he’s on the opposite end of the country from him now, and the world just keeps on turning. Brendon drives his bus, and Spencer sends him letters, sometimes cheerful and hopefully optimistic, making plans for when they’ll meet again. And sometimes they’re gloomy and introspective, talking about the futility of life and how overwhelmed he is by everything, and how Brendon is the only completely good thing in his life right now.

Brendon files them all. He reads them all, and he files them all, and he drives around the country putting steadily more miles between himself and Spencer, and he sits in his bus hopelessly waiting for his other patrons and rereads what Spencer has to say a million times, until the pages should be creased and wrinkled, and wishes he were there with him.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes Spencer sends him smut. Dirty-talk letters about himself and Brendon and what he wants to do to him the next time they see each other.

Brendon reads all of those, too, and he always walks a little stiffly when he goes to file them away.

 

* * *

 

Later, Brendon finds himself wondering if Spencer’s pessimistic outlook on life rubbed off on him somehow. Was transferred over through osmosis, maybe. It’s just – _everything_ gets on his nerves now. Driving gets on his nerves. Waiting around in abandoned parking lots for people who never even condescend to notice him gets on his nerves. Shelving the same old, endless, meaningless array of parking tickets and bus passes and text messages gets on his nerves.

Not even Dallon and his wife having another baby cheers him up – it just makes him remember Spencer and those two fleeting moments they shared, and he’d tear his copy of Dallon’s email announcement to pieces if that didn’t mean so much trouble with the Bosses.

The only saving grace of the whole situation is that Spencer seems to be just as gone over Brendon as Brendon is over Spencer. As far as Brendon knows, Spencer hasn’t been with anyone since that second, fateful night they met. Every once in a while, someone will ask Spencer out, or offer to set him up, or hand him a phone number, but Spencer always says no. It might be different when someone asks in person, Brendon has no way of knowing that, and it’s entirely possible that sometimes Spencer goes to a bar and takes someone home. But he never gets any text messages about great nights or wanting to see someone again, and he certainly doesn’t write any, either. It makes something in Brendon’s chest grow hot with pleasure, that none of these guys can be what Brendon is for Spencer. That Spencer stays true to him regardless of knowing when they’ll meet again, like in the legend of the flying Dutchman that Spencer used to love so much.

So instead of Spencer meeting the guy of his dreams and torturing Brendon with their lovey-dovey communications, there are letters. Every day, without fail, sometimes more than once, Spencer will put his thoughts to paper for Brendon’s sake. Spencer’s handwriting isn’t the easiest thing in the world to read, but that makes it even better, somehow. That sometimes Brendon has to puzzle out the letters, try to parse what that word could be given the context. It becomes a game, almost, one for Brendon to play by himself that makes the Spencer-less hours go by faster, that makes him feel like Spencer’s there at this very moment, looking over his shoulder and laughing at him, when really Spencer hasn’t looked at this piece of paper in hours.

Spencer tends to keep it fairly short, too, unless he’s having a bad day. Sometimes Brendon shelves a parking ticket or some catastrophic news from a newspaper, and then Spencer’s letters are twice as long, bemoaning the state of the world and Spencer’s useless place in it. Brendon doesn’t mind. It’s been a long time since he’s really known what’s going on in the world – Spencer’s rants almost make him feel like a part of it again.

And Spencer reads, too. He writes and he reads, and Brendon’s pretty sure both of it is mostly for Brendon’s benefit, because Spencer reads books like _1,000 Ways to Please Your Lover_ and excerpts from the Kama Sutra, all these texts that make Brendon groan, imagining Spencer imagining these positions with Brendon. He reads articles about kink and sex tips for guys and lots and lots of badly written internet fiction about library porn.

But he also reads other things; normal, everyday things: The newspaper, the ingredient list on his freezer pizza, the bus schedule. Sometimes Brendon thinks he forgets, too, that Brendon reads everything Spencer reads, and then there are books on keeping yourself motivated and articles on depression and more prescriptions from various doctors. Brendon can’t tell for sure if he actually takes them, but he at least gets the bottles, reads the receipts from Walgreens or CVS or whatever, reads tips on how to get out of bed in the morning and the national statistics for Christmas suicides and articles on how to get your shit together when you’re feeling down. It’s hard for him, knowing what Spencer’s going through and knowing there’s nothing he can do to help, but then it must be harder, so much harder, for Spencer himself.

It’s awful. There’s nothing in the world Brendon would rather do than go back there.

 

* * *

 

But he can’t. His orders from up high are clear, and they send him all over the country, waiting in alleyways or on deserted midnight streets for people who never notice him, who hear the music and see the sign and hurry on home, forgetting all about it when they turn the next corner. Forget about _Brendon_ before they’re even through the front door. Spencer’s been the only person to come inside since Brendon became a Librarian in the first place, and in his less charitable moments, he thinks that maybe this is punishment: That he wasn’t supposed to fall in love with Spencer, and that now the powers that be are keeping them apart as a result.

In his meaner moments, he thinks it’s just the sort of thing they’d do.

 

* * *

 

It’s hard to keep track of time, as a Librarian. Brendon didn’t even realize how hard until he met Spencer, until he saw him a second time and realized that _years_ must have passed between their meetings, that while Brendon drove his bus and filed his books and waited for someone to notice him, the seasons had wandered by without him. But now, after seeing Spencer so suddenly grown up, seeing him go from a boy to a man in the blink of an eye, he tries to stay aware of it. Tries to notice the leaves on the trees growing and turning dark green and yellow and red and brown, tries to notice the apple blossoms on the streets and the summer thunderstorms and the snow. It helps that Spencer writes to him – he doesn’t go into detail a lot, but he does mention his birthdays and Christmas and Easter, and Brendon finds himself peering out of the bus windows for clues of the same, tries to match the Santas clinging to the windows to Spencer’s lament of holiday shopping.

Spencer writes him a card for Christmas, just a brief, preprinted note, but it’s got his entire family’s signatures on it, and Brendon keeps it propped up on the dash while he drives the bus through the snow-covered back roads of Missoula, because maybe Melody Carmichael might like to go for a walk in the blizzard and perhaps discover her very own library while her entire family is in town.

He receives a letter from Spencer along with the card, explaining how he tricked his mother and his father and his sisters into signing it by saying it was for his great aunt Marjorie, and how he later had to explain that he had lost it – his dogs had chewed it up, he apparently claimed – to make sure great aunt Marjorie didn’t go empty this year.

 _It’s silly, perhaps,_ the letter says, _but I wanted you to have this. I know my family would love you if they could meet you, and I wanted you to share in the cheer with us._

It still makes Brendon a little choked up when he thinks about it, which is often, because there’s not much else for him to do in Montana. Brendon drives his bus through the deserted streets and smiles at the decorations and the lights, and sings along whenever a Christmas song comes on on the stereo, imagining Spencer doing the same back home in Nevada.

He fantasizes about driving down there, maybe; parking in front of Spencer’s house for New Year’s Eve, even though he knows he can’t. He has to be at Jonathan Parkist’s place that night, down in Austin, while Jonathan goes to a party with his new girlfriend. Brendon tries not to let the rage he feels at that well over.

He’s dead – he doesn’t have any claims on the living, anymore.

 

* * *

 

> _Gorgeous,_
> 
> _Where are you now? I’ve been waiting for you, looking for you, but I can’t find you anywhere. If you’re here, in Chicago, can you give me a sign? Anything, really: a card, a poster, a fiery ‘Brendon was here’ spelled out on my bedroom wall? Anything._
> 
> _Yesterday I started following the arrows on the streets thinking that maybe they were pointing me to you, but all that got me was hopelessly lost with blisters on my feet. Everyone I know thinks I’m going off the rails, and maybe I am. It’s hard to tell what’s a normal, rational reaction, and what’s another step closer to the edge._
> 
> _And how do they know, anyway? How can they tell what’s crazy and what isn’t when I’m not even sure myself? Is drinking tea with the loveliest guy I’ve ever met on a bus that possibly only exists in my head crazy? Really, who are they to judge?_
> 
> _I miss you. I really do, I miss your laugh and your smile and the way your eyes look when you’re sad. They don’t understand because they’ve never met you, but they’d love you. I’m sure of that. They’d stop telling me to not to talk about you – they’d stop telling me to forget you._
> 
> _Because I do, you know? I talk about you a lot. I don’t mean to, but you’re on my mind all the time, and then I remember something else, some brief moment that I didn’t even pay attention to at the time but now, years later, I remember it as clearly as if it had only just happened._
> 
> _Maybe that’s crazy, but I’d like to think it’s just because you’re a fantastic guy. You’re wonderful. Words can’t explain how much you mean to me._
> 
> _Please come see me. I’m waiting for you._ ♥
> 
> _Your Spencer_

 

* * *

 

> _My darling,_
> 
> _I’ve decided on a new course of action:_
> 
> _We should run away together. Come back to me, so we can leave this place behind us. I’ll buy you a ring and everything, steal a car and a suitcase full of cash and we’ll blow down the freeway with the radio blasting and our hair whipping in the wind._
> 
> _We would be unstoppable, because there’s nothing left for us to lose._
> 
> _Say you’ll come with me. Can’t you just see it? Nothing but the road before us, perhaps a couple of sirens behind – Bonnie and Clyde have nothing on us. We’ll keep going forever, because we’ll be unstoppable when we’re together, you and me and no one else. We’ll kiss all night under the desert sky and I’ll keep you warm when the chill catches us by surprise. We can blow through Vegas if you want, see those fake lights and the fake tits and all the greedy sleazy guys who only want our money, and they can take it all and we won’t care because we’ll have each other, and that’s all we need._
> 
> _Say you’ll come – say you feel the same. Say you’ll be mine._
> 
> _(There’s probably a song somewhere in there.)_

 

* * *

 

> _My beloved –_
> 
> _Were you ever here? Do you exist? I’m starting to have my doubts._
> 
> _Ryan says I need to go on vacation._
> 
> _Jon says I need to get laid._
> 
> _My mom sighs a lot and hints around how there are professionals for this kind of thing._
> 
> _They don’t know that the only thing that will fix me is being with you, seeing you, hearing you, having you for my own beyond whoever the fuck do us part._
> 
> _Maybe I AM going crazy. It would explain why you’re not here, at least, when I need you the most._
> 
> _Come back to me, my sweet. There’s nothing here for me without you._

 

* * *

 

Had anyone paid – or been able to pay – any attention to the bus parked on Blake and 11th in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, they would have seen Brendon press a worn, crumpled letter to his chest, head bowed, eyes squeezed tightly shut. They would have seen the way Brendon’s shoulders shook, not unlike the way they moved when he was laughing, and they would perhaps have noticed that something was wrong.

But nobody did.

Nobody ever noticed Brendon, and so there was no one to witness him forcing himself upright, or wiping harshly at his eyes, or reaching down for the key in the ignition to start up the engine.

 

* * *

 

Chicago welcomes him with high winds and clear skies, the last rays of summer warming the hood of the Fleetwood just enough to make the inside pleasantly warm. Brendon worries about the books sometimes, in the dead heat of summer, when the air grows sticky and uncomfortable. The books are the only companions he has, after all, and spending years and years on a bus can’t be good for them.

But then he’s been around for a couple of years, and they have yet to sustain any lasting damage, so who knows. Maybe they’re designed that way.

The bus certainly seems to be, considering the easy way he slides through rush hour traffic despite the honking horns and the roadwork taking up most of Cicero. He eases forward with a song on his lips, going from whistling to singing and back again, and it’s almost good now. He’s still got an ache somewhere in his ribcage that won’t go away, but he’s in Chicago now, and so close to Spencer, and things are going to be okay. He just needs to find him, and give him an enormous hug, and preferably never let him go.

He grins to himself when he spots the note in Spencer’s inbox and reaches for it, happily ignoring the other incoming texts vying for his attention. He can just imagine the look on Spencer’s face when he sees him, how his slack-jaw expression will change into that delighted grin that Brendon loves so much.

 

* * *

 

> _Mom, Dad, annoying brat sisters of mine –_
> 
> _I’m sorry._
> 
> _I’ve tried long and hard to come up with something else to say, something profound, something that’s going to ease the pain and the guilt and the anger you’ll be feeling, but that’s all I got._
> 
> _I’m sorry._
> 
> _My friends –_
> 
> _thank you for putting up with me. I know I haven’t always been the friend you deserve, but I did my best._
> 
> _my love –_
> 
> _I know you’ll read this and you’ll want to come find me, but don’t. Let me go down this road. Maybe it will take me straight to you, and maybe it’ll take me away forever – if so, I apologize. I never meant to cause you pain._
> 
> _Until the next life, or the one after that, my gorgeous. At the risk of sounding like a depressed little Goth boy, I want this to end or I want us to be united forever, but it’s this not-quite-there that I can’t stand. I’m not doing this for you, but I am doing this for us, and I hope you’ll understand._
> 
> ♥
> 
> _Spencer_
> 
>  

* * *

 

The words blur on the page, and it takes Brendon a moment to realize that that is not, in fact, a sign that some sort of divine intervention has CTRL+Z’d Spencer’s fucking _goodbye_. Instead, his tears drip onto the thin paper without smearing the fresh ink.

They dry up as quickly as they came. His cheeks are still wet, but his eyes are clear as ever, and instead, there’s a rush of anger and panic and adrenaline crawling up his throat.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” he asks, incredulous. If Spencer’s really thinking that Brendon’s just going to sit back and wait for Spencer’s collection to vanish, he’s a lot less intelligent than Brendon thought he was.

Brendon may have done a lot of shit he regrets, lots of stupid, unimportant bullshit, but none of them involve sitting idly by while his – his best friend, his love, his _Spencer_ fades away to nothingness. Fuck what Spencer wants, anyway – Brendon is going to damn well save him, if it’s the last thing he does. Brendon is going to save him. Just you watch.

The only question is, how? Calling an ambulance is out, for obvious reasons. So is trying to contact anyone else, because Brendon could be spelling out ‘DANGER’ with his naked body and still, no one would notice him. There isn’t anyone he can alert to Spencer’s plight.

Except…

Except there _is_ one person Brendon can turn to, one person in the whole of Chicago who’ll be able to interact with Brendon and hopefully even believe him. One person with Spencer’s life in his hands, and he doesn’t even know it yet.

Dallon.

 

* * *

 

Dallon lives in Chicago. Brendon doesn’t really care much about him one way or another beyond the fact that Dallon’s got kids now and half the stuff he reads these days is called _Timothy Tunny Swallowed a Bunny_ and _There Is a Bird on Your Head_ , and that’s kind of endlessly entertaining on a guy that age. But he’s here, and he’s the only person in Chicago who’s actually going to notice Brendon, and that means he’s the only person in the world who can save Spencer.

The shelves shift when Brendon thunders along the carpet, becoming the books he wants as he reaches for them. Sometimes Brendon’s not sure about the bus but it must love him because it takes him half the time it should until he’s got Dallon’s personal information in his hands, and he feels a sharp rush of gratitude but he can’t do anything about it. Instead, he tears through Dallon’s files like a man possessed, hoping for an address or some indication of where he might be on what Brendon assumes is a weekday afternoon, and he’s pulled half the folders off the shelf and dropped them onto the floor before he remembers to check his inbox. And there it is – a text message from Breezy, the wife, asking him if he’s still coming to the park to meet up with her and the kids, and Dallon’s reply that he’s on his way.

Brendon’s heart starts thumping so hard he can feel it in his throat. He’s not sure which park, but he remembers that they’ve been there before, and there are only two close to their house, and Brendon is going to take his fucking chances on this one.

 

* * *

 

The bus creaks and groans, clearly displeased at Brendon’s slapdash attempt at steering while he speeds down Humboldt Blvd, and Brendon’s hands tighten on the leather of the wheel in apology but he doesn’t slow down. Only a couple more minutes until he’s there, at the park he’s pretty sure Breezy meant, and he’s not sure how exactly he’s going to find them there when he can’t even leave his bus, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t try.

He drives like a crazy person. After years of trucking along, unnoticed and unbothered, spending days on empty highways with only one eye on the road, he’s gotten used to a sedate kind of driving style that even his grandma would deem too boring.

Not now, though. Now Brendon screeches around corners so quickly he can feel the RV’s weight shift alarmingly, he runs lights so yellow they’re practically cherry-colored and bullies his way from lane to lane, as soon as any one of them offers him a fraction of an inch of progress.

Even if any of the other drivers _were_ to suddenly grow aware of him and get angry, Brendon doesn’t think he’d give a damn. He’s too jittery to care about anything but getting there _now_ , and it certainly doesn’t help that he ends up missing his turn-off twice. Pulling Uies in an RV is a fucking bitch.

He turns onto Armitage on his second attempt with a curse on his lips. A newsstand comes up on the right, and he swerves sharply when he glances over at the people hanging around and sees a tall figure he thinks he recognizes. He pulls into the no parking zone a couple feet over, tires screeching, his heart pounding even though none of the passer-bys so much as look up.

Fumbling off his seatbelt takes a sheer eternity with fingers shaking from adrenaline, and then he’s at the door, squinting across the sidewalk. He’s not sure, but it could be, it _could_ be, and Brendon’s desperate enough at this point to try just about anything.

He takes a deep breath, and leans as far out of the bus as he dares. “Dallon!” he calls.

The guy jerks around, startled, and Brendon waves manically. It’s probably not a good tactic to convince a complete stranger to do him a favor, but he can’t help it. There are things at stake here that he won’t ever be able to be smart about.

“Dallon, come here for a second.”

The guy looks around, but since no one is even looking their way, too engrossed in their little daily lives to notice Brendon and his book mobile, he takes a step closer. “Me?” he asks.

Brendon nods wildly. “Yeah, you,” he says. “Dallon Weekes. I need to talk to you.”

Dallon pushes the magazine he’s been perusing back into its spinning stand and takes another step towards the curb. “Do we know each other?”

“No,” Brendon says, going for honesty. “Not really. But I kind of need your help.”

“Right,” Dallon says. He sounds like he’s halfway between amused and creeped out. “We don’t know each other, but you know who I am and you need my help. Sure.”

“I do,” Brendon says, nodding furiously again. “You’re the only one who can help me, Dallon. You have to believe me.”

“Right on,” Dallon says. He gestures over his shoulder with his thumb. “You know, I’m actually supposed to be somewhere, so…”

“Please, Dallon,” Brendon says. His voice cracks. “I’m not trying to freak you out, but I really need your help.”

“Too late,” Dallon says, frowning, but he still shuffles closer.

Brendon really wants to hug him, but that probably _would_ freak him out beyond an acceptable extent, so he doesn’t.

“Stay here,” he tells Dallon instead, and darts inside as quickly as he can, almost tripping over his feet in his haste. If Dallon walks away now, nothing will save Spencer anymore.

He knocks several books off the shelf, grappling for the folder he’s looking for, but he doesn’t care. He can always pick them up later, after, once Spencer is safe. And if Spencer isn’t safe – Brendon doubts he’s really going to care about a bunch of books then.

There’s a slip of paper in the folder, a bunched up cocktail napkin with the ink smeared by the condensation of a bottle. It’s Ryan’s new number, Brendon knows because Spencer told him; told him they ran into each other in a bar and spent some time saying things that really needed to be said. They were going to go to a museum next weekend, and really, what on Earth was going through Spencer’s head? How could he just give it all up like that?

Brendon drops the folder on the carpet and dashes back to the door, where Dallon’s still waiting, miracle of miracles, even though he’s definitely taken a couple of hesitant steps away.

Brendon comes to an abrupt halt at the very bottom step and thrusts the crumpled paper out at him. “Will you call this number and tell him to go check on Spencer Smith? His name is Ryan. Please, please, it’s important.” He swallows heavily. “It’s really urgent.”

Dallon comes a step closer again. “Why don’t you call him?” he asks, eyes narrowed.

“My phone’s dead, whatever.” Brendon can’t help bouncing on his feet, nerves getting to him. Every second this isn’t working, Spencer is slipping further and further away. “Please, can you just call him? Or the cops, please. Just, _anything_.”

“I’m not calling the cops,” Dallon says. He’s paling even as he speaks. “Not until you tell me what’s going on.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Brendon says. He doesn’t mean to, it just kind of slips out. But honestly. There are times for worrying about being pranked, and _this is not one of them._ “Please,” he says, too loudly. “Please, I’m not some psycho. I wouldn’t be asking about this if it weren’t important.”

Dallon frowns at him, and Brendon’s not particularly hopeful that he actually believes him, but he nevertheless pulls his phone out of his pants pocket, gives Brendon another suspicious look, and then finally, _finally_ , dials.

Brendon holds his breath while Dallon is silent, the phone too far away for him to hear the dial tone, but he stiffens in reply when Dallon suddenly stands up straight. Despite the step Brendon is standing on, they’re pretty much eye to eye.

“Hello, I’m trying to reach Ryan?” He hesitates, perhaps waiting for someone to finish speaking, and then clears his throat. “Hi,” he says carefully. He gives Brendon a quick look. “So I’ve got this guy here telling me that you need to check on Spencer – Smith?” He frowns at Brendon, and Brendon nods quickly. “Yeah, no, I don’t know either.”

He holds the cell down against his collarbone. “What’s wrong with him?”

“He’s hurting himself,” Brendon says, even though it feels like the worst of betrayals to tell that much to a stranger. Sure, Brendon knows Dallon’s life almost as well as he knows Spencer’s, but Spencer doesn’t. Spencer’s alone, and he’s probably scared, and he’s _dying_ , and Brendon feels totally justified in snapping at Dallon because of it.

“You catch that?” Dallon asks into the speaker, giving Brendon a weird look. He listens for a second, then says, “He wants to know how you know that, and why he would, and-.” He hesitates, listening once again, and then holds the phone out for Brendon and pleads, “Look, can _you_ just talk to him? Please?”

Brendon doesn’t. He wraps his fingers around Dallon’s wrist and pushes the phone back to his ear. “If he hasn’t realized by now that Spencer’s fucking suicidal,” he snarls, making Dallon’s eyes grow wide despite his quiet tone, “you can tell him he can turn his best friend badge right back in.”

In fact, Brendon would like nothing better than to happily take it from him, and maybe kick Ryan’s ass while he’s at it, but Dallon’s already relaying the message, still watching Brendon with wide eyes, and shit. Brendon really needs to tone it down before he scares Dallon off entirely.

“He hung up,” Dallon informs him uncertainly. “He sounded pretty frantic.”

That forestalls the epic tantrum Brendon was about to throw, at least, and he looks away and breathes, deeply, through his nose, trying to get himself back under control.

“If the cops call back,”Dallon says, “I’m telling them about you.”

He looks shaky but determined, and Brendon could kiss him.

“Sure,” he says, a laugh fighting past his lips despite everything. “You do that.” He reaches out and squeezes Dallon’s shoulder before the man can evade him. “Thanks, dude,” he says, already drawing back to climb into the driver’s seat.

“That’s – what?” Dallon asks, standing forlornly by the door. “What’s going on? Who the hell are you?”

“Maybe we’ll meet again,” Brendon tells him as he buckles himself in. “But I doubt it, Dallon Weekes.” And with that, he lets the door spring shut between them and sets the blinker to pull out into traffic, leaving Dallon blinking helplessly at the curb.

 

* * *

 

By the time he’s around the corner from Spencer’s, Brendon is bathed in panicked sweat, and he almost mows down a fire hydrant as he’s passing the crowd of heading-home-after-work-ers spilling from the blue line station.

The light he runs is a deep, dark yellow, but he doesn’t care, careening into Spencer’s street with a speed the Fleetwood is most definitely not equipped to handle. At least the street is clear of anything but cars parked left and right, and Brendon’s just about to floor it and head for Spencer’s at something like seventy miles over the speed limit when he catches sight of somebody speed-walking down the sidewalk ahead of him.

It’s Spencer’s friend Ryan, it has to be – the one Spencer grew apart with when Ryan found new ways to occupy himself without Spencer but still kept bugging him about things Spencer didn’t want to be bugged about. Brendon has only ever seen blurry photographs of him, in the back of the print used for Spencer’s graduation photo for one, and he probably wouldn’t have noticed him at all if Spencer hadn’t mentioned him occasionally, script jerking angrily.

So yes, Ryan may have grown a little taller, a little fuller in the face, his hair might have grown longer and his sense of fashion even more eccentric, but Brendon is still as sure as he can be, under the circumstances. There is, of course, the possibility that Brendon just _wants_ to be sure, but that’s fine. Brendon will take his chances.

He rides his bus so close to the curb he’s a bit surprised he doesn’t accidentally hop it, or perhaps clip a street sign or something. Thank God the street is quiet and empty, though; it allows him to stick as close to Ryan as he can, even though he wants nothing more than to open the doors and yell at the guy to start running, already.

Perhaps that psychic thing Spencer was hoping for isn’t such a stretch after all, because Ryan breaks into a light jog a moment later. It’s nothing but awkward on his skinny frame, but that’s fine – as long as he _hurries_ , Brendon doesn’t give a damn how bad he looks at it.

He’s so preoccupied with staring at Ryan’s back, willing him to go faster, already, that he almost misses their arrival at Spencer’s building and has to hit the brakes hard when Ryan suddenly pushes open one of the gates lined up next to the sidewalk and takes long strides for the door.

There’s a parking space across the intersection, or at least an empty space next to both a stop sign and a fire hydrant, but Brendon’s reasonably certain he’ll be forgiven for not giving a damn.

When he glances in the mirror, he can see Ryan press the middle doorbell of three, frowning when nothing happens. It’s not very reassuring, but at least somebody’s _doing something_ , so Brendon takes a moment to unbuckle his seatbelt and just breathe. It’ll be fine. It’ll be _fine_.

In Brendon’s side mirror, Ryan’s got his phone pressed to his ear now, and his thumb pressed to the buzzer. The window right above the front door is cracked, and Ryan stares up at it, mouth set in a hard line.

Nothing happens, except for Brendon making his way down the bus steps and pressing his face up against the glass panes of the door. Eventually, Ryan slides his cell into his pocket. Brendon can see him hesitate, and then press all the other buzzers, too, before he starts pounding on the door with the flat of his hand, yelling for Spencer. The neighbors won’t be happy, but Brendon doesn’t mind that. The more people trying to get to Spencer, the better.

Now that he’s no longer running on sheer adrenaline, his heart suddenly gives a painful thump. His mouth goes utterly dry at the thought that he was the _only one_ knowing something was wrong, the one person in the world who couldn’t do anything for Spencer but sit there and worry. With Spencer’s attendance record and his rocky friendships, it could have been _days_ before someone grew concerned and tried to contact him – days more before anyone actually _did_ anything.

Brendon has to quiet down and just breathe for a minute when that thought hits him – the thought that, if he hadn’t found Dallon, if he’d still been at work or at home or at a café or anything, there wouldn’t have been anything Brendon could have done. There would have been nothing for him to do but to sit and hope. Only hope.

There’s a crowd of people gathering in front of the door now, neighbors from the looks of things. Brendon kind of wants to shout at them to skip the gawkers and just call an ambulance already, but the whole thing is out of his hands now, as much as he hates to admit it. He’s just going to have to trust Ryan to get it right.

 

* * *

 

It’s a lot harder than it sounds. Brendon spends sheer eternities just shifting in his seat, yelling silent threats and demands and questions like, why they won’t just break down the door already, isn’t it obvious that Spencer’s in trouble? He almost sinks to his knees when a car pulls up a couple of houses away and a janitor gets out, or the landlord or something, fiddling with a ring of keys as he makes his way up the walk. At least Ryan now looks as faint as Brendon feels – he’s standing off to the side, poised like he’s going to take off running the minute Spencer’s door is open. He follows the other guy inside so closely he’s almost stepping on his heels, and Brendon can see the guy is getting annoyed even from this distance, but Brendon can’t feel anything but relief.

Even when a whole crowd of people surges forward and pushes inside, he only feels relief, perhaps mingled with a little bit of resentment. Of course he’d like to be at the forefront, storming Spencer’s apartment like a knight charging a fortress; of course he wants to be the one to cradle Spencer in his arms, to save him.

But as long as that’s not an option, he wants every single person in front of that door to go looking. He wants as many people as possible trying to save Spencer, if he has to be stuck out here, waiting, with nothing to go on except his pounding heart.

 

* * *

 

From his vantage point, Brendon can’t see much. He hears the sirens long before the ambulance pulls up in front of the house, and he can see people rushing about, but he doesn’t even see a stretcher before the doors are slammed and the sirens go off again. The only thing he sees is a tall, skinny figure, standing forlornly in the wreckage left of the front yard with his arms wrapped tightly around himself.

 

* * *

 

Spencer doesn’t read anything for days.

 

* * *

 

Brendon drives the bus, drives for hours and hours and hours, clinging to nothing but the knowledge that Spencer’s books are still here. Spencer has to be alive, still, because his collection still exists. Brendon has no idea what state he’s in, though, if he’s sleeping or comatose or gone blind, even, he has no news and no idea how to find out this information.

So he drives, circling Chicago’s hospitals – even Lurie Children’s, in his desperation. He goes from clinic to clinic, and sometimes he goes to Ryan’s house or Spencer’s or Jon’s parents’, and when he tires of that he drives along the shoreline until he can no longer keep his eyes open, until he has to pull over and lean back in his seat because the road blurs before his eyes and he still can’t sleep.

 

* * *

 

Brendon has no idea how long it’s been. He’s trying to catch up with the ever-growing pile of incoming files, from everyone but Spencer, vaguely hoping that he’ll tire himself out enough sleep for more than twenty minutes without jerking awake to nightmarish visions of Spencer dying.

Spencer choking, Spencer crying, Spencer.

He reaches into Spencer’s shelf by rote, a habitual movement that’s been nothing but terrifying over the last couple of days, and he almost drops everything in his arms when his fingertips brush against a slip of cardboard.

It’s a get well card, with a bandaged teddy bear on the front and enthusiastic well-wishes inside, signed with names Brendon recognizes from Spencer’s culinary classes. Then there’s one from Spencer’s sisters, short and worried, telling him they’ll come out as soon as they can. And then there’s ticker tape from a news show, just a line or so about stocks, and that’s all, but Brendon presses them all to his chest and sobs, just once, before he goes to file them away.

 

* * *

 

Spencer is discharged days later, with a metric ton of pills to accompany him and meetings scheduled with three different psychiatrists. Brendon doesn’t see him go – he’s out by the shore, with his feet propped up on the dash, contemplating the wide blue nothing stretching out before him. It’s better for him than to wait anxiously for the next arrival for _Smith, Spencer James_ ’s collection. They both make him want to cry, but only one makes him twist his fingers in his hair and twist as hard as he can just to distract himself from the pressure.

He doesn’t know where Spencer goes, or if he looked for Brendon on the way. Brendon could find out the former easily enough, but he’s been ignoring the texts piling up in his inbox and he intends to keep it that way for as long as possible. As for the latter – he’s not sure he wants to know. Isn’t sure if it’d be better if Spencer, after all this, still wants to see him, to be with him (to prove that not even almost dying can knock some sense into him), or if he’s realized the error of his ways and decided to stay away from Brendon after all.

Not that he’s been able to resist sneaking a glance or two at what Spencer’s been reading. (Brendon’s notoriously bad at resisting Spencer, which could well have contributed to their current problematic situation.)

Spencer’s still pretty out of sorts, it looks like, considering the Dixie Chicks have been his constant companion for the last couple of days – at least if Spencer requesting their entire discography to his room is any indication. Brendon can’t really blame his family for indulging him.

There have been plenty of cards and emails coming in, too, but they don’t make anything better, as far as Brendon can tell. It’s not like Spencer had a serious illness of some kind that people could congratulate him on beating or encourage him to fight. Apparently an attempted suicide makes people treat you differently – awkwardly. Brendon just hopes these people weren’t this stiff and uncertain when Spencer spent time with them before, because that cannot have been a particularly pleasant experience.

It’s not his problem, though.

He’s not sure Spencer’s his problem, either, not really, because clearly, taking this much interest in Spencer’s private life was a mistake. He doesn’t want Spencer to think that the only thing left for him is an existence like Brendon’s, because Brendon’s existence, quite frankly, sucks ass. But he cares about Spencer. How could he not? Spencer is so sweet and smart and talented, even if apparently he doesn’t see it that way, and Brendon’s pretty sure he doesn’t have it in him to let Spencer go.

He _should_ let Spencer go.

He doesn’t, though. He still reads every scrap of paper that passes through Spencer’s hands, desperate for even the tiniest shred of news, and it’s not until he pulls the official discharge out of his inbox that he returns to his _actual_ job, fishes all the neglected incoming texts out of their respective cubbies, gathers the stack of glossy paper to his chest and gets to work.

When he’s sorted everything into its proper place, a thankless task made ever more difficult by the fact that the writing keeps blurring in front of his tired eyes, he sinks back into the driver’s seat and closes his eyes. He’d keep them open if that would help, but it doesn’t – open, closed, asleep or awake, he can’t help but wonder what it is Ryan saw that had him so shaken up.

He leans back his head over the headrest until the blood rushing to his brain makes him dizzy, and even then it’s the pain in his neck that finally makes him draw upright again. Lake Mead is still stretched out before him, vanishing into the mist without ever reaching the other side, pale, dirty blue. No matter how much Brendon wishes, nothing has changed. Spencer’s still crazy, and Brendon’s still alone.

He glances over into his inbox tray out of habit, even though nothing should have accumulated in the last two minutes or so. It’s lunchtime, so everybody with a job is busy scarfing down their sandwiches before it’s back to the grind, and all the college kids are still passed out.

There’s a piece of paper waiting for him. It’s white and long, standard printer paper, and when Brendon pulls it out of the tray, he can see that’s it’s almost entirely blank.

There’s nothing much on it, except for one single line: _Come find me._

The paper shakes in Brendon’s hand. It’s probably not a good idea, considering everything that’s happened, but even as that thought flits through Brendon’s mind, he already knows his choice is made.

He leaves the paper to flutter gently back into the in-tray and reaches down to start the ignition.

He never could deny Spencer anything.

 

* * *

 

It’s growing dark by the time Brendon arrives in Chicago proper, and he catches the last bit of rush hour traffic, but that’s fine. It gives him some time to get his head together, regardless of how successful he is at that endeavor. He keeps his hands clamped tightly around the steering wheel for as long as he can. Sure, he forgets every couple of minutes and doesn’t remember until he catches himself whacking against the leather along to whatever drumbeat is currently playing on the stereo, but whenever he grows aware of what he’s doing, he forces himself to still his hands.

Around him, cars honk and rev their engines, brake lights growing ever brighter in the encroaching darkness.

Spencer lives on W Chestnut. Brendon finds the street again easily enough, the house and its neighboring buildings burned into his irises, and even though his hands are shaking, he parks the Fleetwood on the curb opposite Spencer’s building as neatly as ever. He leaves the lights on, illuminating the street before him, casting eerie shadows with trashcans and parked cars. He lets the music play, _Three Little Birds_ , and sits down on the bus steps and watches Spencer’s window.

There’s light on, inside, the dim light of a bedside lamp illuminating the room with a weak, warm glow. There’s no movement inside, so maybe Spencer’s asleep, but the window is open, and in any case Brendon has no choice but to wait. He hums along to Bob Marley on the stereo, a nervous tick, nothing more, and then gropes behind him for the inbox with blind, practiced movements to see if anything new has arrived since he pulled up. It hasn’t – everyone must be asleep by now, or else preoccupied with some other, non-reading activity. Brendon can’t even begin to express how pleased he is about that. Mountains of paper could be piling up around him and he wouldn’t even care, but it’s good to know he won’t have to deal with the fallout of his procrastination later.

So it’s with a heavy heart and an easy conscience that he concentrates on Spencer’s window, but he still startles quite badly when someone appears in the frame, almost tipping off his seat in surprise. Whoever it is, is backlit and Brendon has no way of knowing if that really is Spencer, but it might be – something about the posture, the curl of his hair, makes him think that perhaps that _is_ Spencer in there, looking out at Brendon’s RV parked across the street. Spencer knowing that Brendon found him, just as he requested.

A moment later the figure disappears again, and even though Brendon’s heart gives a sharp jolt at that, it’s followed by nothing but silence.

He knows, logically, that Spencer is going to need some time, perhaps to get dressed and put on his shoes, to climb down the stairs and come to the door, but every second Spencer doesn’t come makes the nausea in his stomach grow. Every second the door stays firmly shut is another moment of Brendon thinking that perhaps he shouldn’t have come here, perhaps he should have stayed away and let Spencer heal like he so obviously needs to.

His stomach unclenches sharply when a shadow becomes visible through the glass set in the door, and a moment later, Spencer shuffles out into the night. Brendon is a little amazed that his parents aren’t sleeping in front of Spencer’s bedroom door, but they must not, because when Spencer stumbles out, there’s no one there to yank him back inside. Brendon wants to yell and scream and curse them, because how dare they leave Spencer alone after all this, but at the same time it means getting to see Spencer, so he can’t hold on to his anger for very long.

It slips away entirely a moment later, when Spencer steps into the bus’ light. He’s pale, with deep, dark circles under his eyes, his hair a tangled, grown-out mess. He’s thin around the ribs and heavy around the middle, and his jean jacket hangs off his shoulders where it used to stretch with every movement.

It’s a frightening sight. Spencer should be in his prime, a young man at the peak of his physical and mental fitness, and yet he’s never looked worse. He looks like even walking the handful of feet from his building to Brendon’s bus drained all the energy he had, and that thought is just all kinds of terrifying.

“Hi,” Brendon whispers. There’s a small, timid smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, and maybe he shouldn’t, because he’s still scared and he’s kind of pissed, but he can’t help it. This is the first proof he’s gotten that Spencer is actually, truly, legitimately okay, and even with the marks around his mouth and nose, it’s still the best sight in the world.

“Hey,” Spencer says, voice rough. They had to pump his stomach, Brendon knows, and he can only imagine how much Spencer’s throat must hurt.

At least he’s got on that jacket to ward off the chill of the night wind. He’s wearing pajamas underneath, mismatched but soft and comfortable, nothing at all like Brendon imagines a hospital gown must feel. Brendon clenches his fingers in the fabric and into the soft skin underneath, reveling in the heat seeping through the cotton. Spencer might look like death warmed over, but he’s alive. He’s still alive.

Spencer makes a little noise in the back of his throat, and Brendon wants to tell him how good it is to see him, how glad he is that Spencer’s okay, but he can’t. His throat won’t work, catching on every sound he makes, and in the end all he can do is clutch at Spencer’s shoulders as hard as he can and concentrate on the strength in Spencer’s arms as he grips him back.

“You’re okay,” he says, whisper-soft, into the fine strands of Spencer’s hair. “You’re okay.”

He’s not convinced Spencer can hear him, but then he’s also not sure he even wants Spencer to hear, so that’s okay.

“You’re here,” Spencer mumbles into Brendon’s collarbone, after a long, uncertain silence. “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”

 _Didn’t_ think _you’d come_ , is what Brendon is pretty sure he means, but he’s not sure he’s ready to contemplate the full extent of that, so instead he tightens his grip on Spencer’s shoulders and pushes him far enough away so he can look him in the eye.

“Of course I’m here. You really think I’d leave you all alone?” He gives Spencer a little shake at that terrifying thought. “You’re not, right? Spencer. You’re not on your own, are you?”

“Ryan’s been around a lot,” Spencer murmurs, absently, like he’s going to tell Brendon because he asked but there’s nothing in the world that he’d like to talk about less. “’M not sure why, but I guess he feels guilty.” He glances briefly at Brendon before he looks away again. “He said I could come over whenever.”

“And your parents?” Brendon asks. He ducks his head so Spencer is forced to meet his eyes. “Where are your parents, Spencer, tell me.”

“Asleep on the couch,” Spencer mumbles. “I don’t think they slept much.”

Brendon can’t imagine _anyone_ sleeping much in that situation, but then Spencer is still recovering. He probably can’t fathom staying awake for more than a few hours at a time.

“Right,” he says, when the silence stretches on thick and unending.

Spencer starts fidgeting almost immediately – the whole business seems to have made him a bit twitchy. “I don’t,” he says. He flaps his arms uselessly. “I don’t know what to do.”

“We’ll have tea,” Brendon says. His voice is reedy and high, but he can’t do anything about that. “Just like always, okay? We’ll have tea and it’ll be fine.”

Spencer nods slowly. He doesn’t look very happy, but there’s not a whole lot Brendon can do to make him less upset. Brendon can’t give him but he wants, but he can make them tea, so tea is what they’ll have.

He wants to tell Spencer to sit, but his throat won’t form the words, so he just gestures at the carpet between them and heads for his water heater. It’s just tea. He can handle tea.

While he’s busy with the water and the cups, he can hear Spencer settling on the carpet behind him. He doesn’t turn around though – he’s starting to feel a low, simmering kind of anger growing deep in his gut, all that fear turning into quiet rage now that Spencer’s here and safe, and he doesn’t think Spencer needs anybody yelling at him now. If Brendon’s at all indicative of what people feel when somebody they love attempts suicide, then Spencer’s gotten enough of that for the past day or so.

Spencer whispers a ‘thank you,’ when Brendon hands him a mug, although he won’t quite look Brendon in the eye. Brendon can’t think of anything to say in reply that doesn’t sound trite or overly cheerful, so he just nods, concentrating instead on sitting down as well without spilling tea all over himself. He can’t quite resist sneaking a glance once he’s got his knees pulled up to his chest and his ankles crossed, and he knows from the psychology books that Tim always reads that that’s a defensive position, but he’s feeling a little raw right now, okay? He thinks he’s allowed.

And besides, Spencer’s got plenty of defensiveness going on himself, curled up to the side with his shoulder towards Brendon. For a while, Brendon thinks that they’re never going to get past this stony silence, but then Spencer clears his throat.

“You’re staring,” he says hoarsely, making Brendon hastily look away. “What?”

“Why did you come back that time?” Brendon glances up at him from underneath his bangs, trying to gauge Spencer’s expression, but Spencer’s not looking at him. “When we first met. That night, why did you come back?”

It suddenly seems absolutely vital that he know – like everything, all of Spencer’s issues and Brendon’s fucked up existence and _everything_ \- hinges on Spencer’s answer.

For the longest time, Brendon thinks that Spencer’s not going to answer at all, but then he takes a deep breath and says, “I don’t know. I was standing on that corner and I could still see the RV and I thought, ‘What if he’s telling the truth? What if I’m somehow meant to meet this guy?’” He shrugs. “And after that, I couldn’t not go back. Just the idea was too horrible to contemplate.”

“Right,” Brendon says, swallowing.

“I don’t know,” Spencer says again, shrugging once more. His voice is soft. “It was like, fate or something.”

He purses his lips to take a sip, and that’s as far as he gets before he sets the cup down on the saucer again, ceramic clinking, and turns away, hiding his face against his shoulder.

Brendon drinks his tea because he doesn’t know what else to do. He’d go over and hug Spencer if he dared, but he’s not sure he’s allowed. Even though Spencer’s done what he’s done to be closer to Brendon, there’s a wall between them now that was never there before.

Spencer seems to sense it, too, because he stays stiff and upright and won’t look at Brendon even when he’s pulled himself as tall as he can.

“Can I look at the –?” he asks, gesturing over his shoulder, and Brendon trips all over himself in his rush to assure him that it’s fine.

Spencer pushes the cup aside carefully, hesitating only briefly when liquid sloshes over the side regardless, and gets to his feet with one hand moving along the wall to support himself. He moves slowly, like an old man, and Brendon drops his gaze and ends up staring at the golden liquid gathering in Spencer’s saucer to avoid the way seeing him like this makes his heart hurt.

He should probably clean up, or something, if only to keep himself from slowly going crazy, but he ends up sitting there for who knows how long, staring at the tips of his sneakers and trying to talk himself out of tearing out his hair.

He’s so focused on not doing anything stupid that he ends up not moving at all, not until Spencer comes back into view with this horrible blank look on his face that – and this is, strangely enough, kind of reassuring – quickly morphs into despair.

“Brendon,” he says, and Brendon’s moving before he even thinks, rushing over with a hasty, “Hey, hey, it’s okay.”

Spencer shakes his head. “I can’t do this, Brendon.” He presses the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. “I tried. I tried.”

"You can." With his heart hammering away in his chest, Brendon wraps his fingers around Spencer’s wrists and pulls them away from his face. He doesn’t let go. “You have to keep on going,” he says, squeezing his eyes shut against the utter despair unfolding on Spencer’s face. “Please, Spencer. You have to keep going. For me.”

“I can’t,” Spencer whispers. “Brendon, no. You can’t ask that of me.”

“You _have_ to,” Brendon says. His voice cracks on the words, and he swallows hard and says it again. “You have to, Spencer. You’re breaking my heart, every day, and the only thing that keeps me sane is knowing that you’re out there, alive and well. You going on is the only way I can go on.”

Spencer’s crying now, wiping at his eyes only for more tears to spill out. He shakes his head, whispering, “I can’t, I can’t,” but Brendon doesn’t let him look away.

He puts his hand on Spencer’s cheek and turns him around to face Brendon, to meet his eyes when Brendon says, clearly, “You can.”

Spencer stares at him, blue eyes leaking tears, and Brendon has to turn his head away as he swallows.

“ _Please_ ,” he whispers. “Please, Spencer. For me.”

Spencer shakes his head. “Brendon, no,” he returns, just as hushed. “Can’t we just…leave? We’ll just go. Leave all this behind and find somewhere to stay, just the two of us. It’ll be great. Can’t you just see how great that would be?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Brendon says. Somehow, his voice sounds a lot calmer than he feels. “I don’t want to be the cause of all this, Spencer.”

“You’re not,” Spencer says desperately. “Please. I promise I won’t do it again.” He’s big- and shiny-eyed, looking as earnest as Brendon’s ever seen him.

It’s the hardest thing Brendon’s ever done, shaking his head. “It’s not gonna work, Spencer,” he says.

Spencer makes a little noise, just a choked-off little breath, but it’s still enough to just about break Brendon’s heart.

“No,” Spencer says. “No.”

“You need help,” Brendon says. He doesn’t recognize his own voice, so cold and sure. “You need meds and a shrink, and not a semi-existent long-distance boyfriend.”

“I need _you_ ,” Spencer protests, forgetting to be quiet for a moment. “I don’t need anything but you.”

Brendon stares at him, searching his face for some sort of sign that Spencer means it, and he seems to. He looks as determined as Brendon’s ever seen him, as sure, but he’s still pale and tired-eyed and Brendon can’t forget that no seven days ago, Spencer was convinced the only way to go on was to end it all.

And he can’t. He’d do just about anything to make Spencer happy, but apparently risking Spencer’s fragile, unbalanced life isn’t one of them.

“Come on,” he says, stepping back. “I’ll take you to Ryan’s.”

 

* * *

 

Brendon drives while Spencer cries, curled up on the steps with his arms wrapped around his knees as he stares at the pavement rolling by. Brendon’s vision isn’t exactly clear, either, but he’s driven this bus long enough to know that he’s not going to hit anything. He keeps half an eye on the road and the other on Spencer, on the way his shoulders shudder, the way his hair falls into his eyes.

Brendon wants nothing more than to just keep going. He wants to take them both out of Chicago, hit the road, go wherever – they could go all the way down to Tierra del Fuego, if they wanted. It’s on the tip of his tongue to offer Spencer everything – his bus, his very existence. He’d build a castle for Spencer if he could.

He can’t, though. The only thing he can do is deliver him on Ryan’s doorstep, to someone who cares and can actually comfort him, and won’t just make everything worse.

 

* * *

 

The door opens with a low squeak that Brendon absently makes a note to look at. For now, though, there’s just Spencer, staring at the tarmac at the bottom of the steps like it might eat him.

After a hesitant, almost pleading look in Brendon’s direction, though, he slowly descends, taking careful step after careful step, but he doesn’t even make it halfway down before he’s turning back to Brendon, looking like he might try to cling to him if he thought Brendon would let him.

“Don’t leave me,” he says.

Brendon thinks he might be gearing up for a whole argument, but when he doesn’t say anything, Spencer just bites his lip and looks away.

“Please don’t leave me.”

It’s enough to break anybody’s heart, and as much as Brendon told himself that he’d stay firm and see this through, he can’t let Spencer go like this, thinking Brendon doesn’t care about him.

“I’ll be here, Spencer,” he whispers. “I promise. I’ll never leave you, not even if the earth ripped apart below us.”

Spencer nods, but he doesn’t look at Brendon. With his head tilted away, his face is hidden in the shadows, and when Brendon reaches out to touch his cheek, his skin is still wet.

“Don’t,” Spencer says, jerking his head away.

Brendon would like to pretend it doesn’t sting, but he’s given away the right to become upset when he told Spencer they couldn’t see each other anymore, so he just takes a steadying breath and lets his hand drop.

“I mean that, Spencer. I’m never going to leave you.”

“You’re leaving me now,” Spencer protests, but Brendon doesn’t even have to say anything this time for him to look away.

It’s probably better that way – Brendon’s not sure he _could_ say anything, even if he wanted to. He can’t even pull away, because Spencer has to be the one making this step. Despite what he said, he can’t bring himself to make Spencer think Brendon’s _left_ him. Spencer has to be the one leaving, this time.

He does, eventually. It takes a long, long, time, but finally Spencer takes a step back, and then another, and another, almost slip-sliding off the curb with unsteady legs. He breaks eye-contact then, turning away, and doesn’t look away, although Brendon makes himself watch every unhappy step taking Spencer away from him.

He watches as Spencer crosses the road, carefully, looking both ways, and then has to struggle with the garden gate for what seems like an overly long amount of time. He doesn’t look back though, just like he promised, when he finally wrenches the latch open and stumble up the path.

He hesitates over the panel of doorbells but he doesn’t look back over his shoulder, even though he twitches his head a couple of times like maybe he really, really wants to.

But he doesn’t. After a long moment of him just standing there, waiting, he reaches out and presses his thumb firmly against one of the buttons, and then buries his hands in his pockets and waits some more.

Brendon’s breath hitches when the door swings open what seems like an eternity later, and Ryan steps into the shine of the porch lamp, sleep-ruffled and disgruntled. His face goes from hope to relief to anger in a split second, and he opens his mouth, but then Spencer takes another step forward, into the light, and tilts his face up, and Ryan doesn’t say anything. Instead, he takes the two steps down and wraps his skinny arms tightly around Spencer’s shoulders, whispering into Spencer’s ear until Spencer’s shoulders come down a little bit.

He starts to rub at Spencer’s back, then, coming down a couple of steps so they’re side by side rather than face to face, and wraps his long fingers carefully around Spencer’s arm like he’s trying to usher him inside.

Brendon wants that, and then he doesn’t – he wants Spencer to have a home, that kind of security that he’s so clearly lacking right now. He wants Spencer to have someone that will ease his anguish even if they don’t understand just why he’s so upset.

But then he doesn’t want them to go, because once Spencer’s out of sight he’ll have to leave, and then he’ll never see him again.

In the end, he’s not sure if he wants this moment to go by as quickly as possible or if he wants it to never end. He stays silent, watching, until Ryan makes the decision for him; curves his arm around Spencer’s shoulders and urges him inside. Spencer allows himself to be tugged along, doesn’t look back, doesn’t even look up from his feet.

Brendon tells himself he’s happier for it. It’s better that way. Clean break, and all that, he knows what they say.

None of it explains why it hurts to even breathe when the door of #12 falls shut across the street.

 

* * *

 

Brendon drives. He drives until he can’t anymore, until he’s sobbing too hard to keep the wheel steady and has to pull over. He has no idea where he is – it’s dark, and there are trees, and the streets are deserted. The bus is probably blocking half the road, but he can’t think about that, he can’t, not when he’s just had to give up Spencer for good. He can’t breathe and he’s not sure if it’s because everything seems to hurt or just because he’s crying so hard, and it’s not like it matters, really, because the only thing he can think about is Spencer. And not Spencer’s smile, or the look of concentration on his face when he’d dragged his hands down Brendon’s torso. All he sees when he closes his eyes are the drawn features of Spencer’s face, his hollow cheeks, his grey-tinged skin.

It’s enough to drive the sanest person up the wall, and Brendon’s never been known for being particularly level-headed, so he ends up taking the tried-and-true route to forgetting his heartache: Work. He checks the inboxes, all mercifully quiet at this time of night, he turns the heater down a bit, he doesn’t think of Spencer and Ryan at Ryan’s apartment, what Spencer must be going through, how Brendon isn’t there.

He busies himself with the remains of tea, scrubbing at the stained rims left by the liquid like that might erase the evening from his memory, and when he finally stows the cups away, his fingertips are pruned and vulnerable.

Then he looks down the corridor, eyes checking the order of the call numbers out of habit, and hesitates.

There’s a book spread open on the ground, spine bent in a way that makes Brendon’s already bruised Librarian heart ache. Maybe falling back on the everyday, the numb and painless, will help a little bit, so he takes a deep breath, just once, and heads on over.

It’s Spencer’s book, _The Phantom Ship_ , and when Brendon goes to pick it up, he finds himself dragging the pad of his thumb over the cover instead. Even though the fabric covering it is anything but cheap material, it’s worn through at the edges, and someone’s drawn a crude pirate skull on the back.

Brendon takes a deep, shuddering breath, and instead of pushing the book back into the thin sliver of space waiting for it on the shelf, he sinks onto the carpet instead. He sits with his back pressed against the spines of Spencer’s beloved childhood books, sharp corners digging into his ribs, and breathes. Then he opens the book at the very first page, leafing past the inscription and the dog-eared page with Spencer’s book stamp, and begins to read.

The End

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[mix] the night book mobile](https://archiveofourown.org/works/850766) by [growlery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/growlery/pseuds/growlery)
  * [Art for "Starcrossed" by bad_peppermint](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3290900) by [akamine_chan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/akamine_chan/pseuds/akamine_chan)




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